Out of Context

SUFISM IS NOT A DOCTRINE BUT A DISCIPLINE, A METHOD OF inner transformation, an alchemical device - to change the lower into the higher, to change the baser metal into gold. It does not believe in talking about God. Rather, It believes in creating God. It does not believe in great philosophical argumentation - that is all rubbish. Its whole emphasis is on how to destroy man's mechanicalness, how to de-automatize man, how to release awareness in him.

Self-remembering is its only and its whole philosophy.

If you can understand one word, 'self-remembering', you have understood all that Sufism consists of.

Man lives, but without any remembrance of who he is. Then you can go on doing a thousand and one things, but failure is going to be your fate. You are doomed to fail, because unconsciousness fails. Only consciousness succeeds, because it is only through consciousness that you become part of the divine cosmos. Unconscious, you remain apart. Unconscious, you are confined by your ego, you are like an island. Conscious, the ego melts, you become one with the whole, the harmony of the whole.

The part is going to fail. The part cannot succeed. Only the whole succeeds.

That is the meaning of the ancient statement: SATYAM EVAM JAYATE - it is only truth that wins.

Why is it only truth that wins? Because to be true is to be with God; to be true is to be with the ultimate law of existence, is to be in tune with. Tao. And the whole cannot fail.

The individual is bound to fail. And unless you remember, you will remain an individual. The moment you remember, the miracle happens, the paradox happens: in self-remembering, self disappears; only remembering is left. In non-self-remembering, there is no remembering, but the self continues.

The self and remembering cannot exist together; their co-existence is not possible.

Sufism can be reduced to a single method: self-remembering. A man who remembers himself functions in a different way. Never imitate anybody, because by imitation you are not going to reach.

If by chance you are fortunate and blessed and you come across a Buddha, learn how to remember.

Don't imitate him. If you imitate a Buddha, you will be just a dummy Buddha, a false entity, of no worth. And you will become more and more stupid - imitators always become stupid.

Intelligence never grows by imitation: intelligence grows by experimentation. Intelligence grows by taking challenges. Intel-ligence grows by accepting questions and endeavoring to find their answers.

Imitation means the question has not yet even arisen, and you have accepted the answer. If the question has not arisen then the season is not ripe - don't sow the seeds, they will die. It will be sheer wastage.

But it happens: if you come across a Buddha, his being, his presence is magnetic - you would like to be like him. His grace enchants you. You would like to learn his way of life. You will start imitating unconsciously. That too happens unconsciously. He looks so beautiful, he looks so silent and so blessed - who would not like to imitate him? But if you imitate, you miss, because consciousness cannot be imitated. It has to be created. You have to become the lab. You have to become the experiment. You have to create the fire. You have to create the patience. You have to create many things which are ingredients for the inner chemistry, and then the flame comes one day. Then you are a Buddha in your own right. Not a copy! not a carbon copy.

Your innermost being will be exactly like the Buddha, but your outer personality will be different. A Jesus is a Jesus, a Krishna is a Krishna, a Rumi is a Rumi, a Mansoor is a Mansoor. From the periphery they are AS different as people can be different, but from the innermost core their taste is one, similarly one.

What is that taste? That is the taste of self-remembering.

The body is different. Buddha has a different shape, Mohammed has certainly a different shape; their eyes, their noses, their faces, their hands, are different; their languages are different, their characters are different. Mohammed has a sword in his hand and Buddha will not touch a sword, never. Krishna has a flute - you cannot visualize Mahavir having a flute. It is impossible. Jesus is on the cross, in that deep agony of humanity, as if all the agony of all the human beings has centered into the being of Jesus. And Krishna is dancing, as if all the ecstasies of all possible human beings are gathered together. But if you look deep, in the agony of Jesus and in the ecstasy of Krishna, the taste is the same. Dancing, Krishna is remembering. Dying, Jesus is remembering. Buddha is sitting silently under his tree, with utter self-remembering, and Meera is dancing, with great abandon, but deepest at the core there is the flame of self-remembering.

Self-remembering is the soul of religion.

But we always see the periphery. If you come to me, you will see my periphery, you will not see my center. That is not available to ordinary eyes. Unless you grow the eyes of a disciple, you will not be able to see it. Unless you grow the inner eye you will only see my circumference. And I am not my circumference: I am my center. The circumference is accidental, but the center is not accidental - it is essential. The same center can exist in different circumferences. But the ordinary eyes will see only the outer, and will become obsessed with the outer and will start imitating it - in the hope that "Maybe someday, imitating, and imitating more perfectly, we will arrive at the center." There is no way from the periphery to the center!

Let this be remembered by you always and always: there is no way from the periphery to the center.

There is certainly a way from the center to the periphery. If the inner changes, the outer changes of its own accord - but not vice versa. Just by changing the outer, you will not be able to change the inner. In fact, by changing the outer you will become a hypocrite. By changing the outer, you will become split, you will become two. Rather than becoming one, you will be divided. And all divisions bring misery.

And this is the greatest division: when somebody's center speaks one language and the circumference another, he starts falling into a kind of schizophrenia. These two poles will become farther and farther apart, and he will not be able to keep himself together. Sooner or later he will fall into fragments. That's what madness is.

Never imitate, otherwise you are on the path of being mad. UNDERSTAND, but never imitate. When a Master speaks, whatsoever he is saying is true in HIS context. Don't take his statements out of his context, otherwise you have missed the meaning.

And I know: even out of context those statements LOOK meaningful, but they are no more meaningful. Meaning is never in the words but always in the context. In that way, all dictionaries are false, because in a dictionary there are only words without context. You read a word 'love'. Now what meaning can the word 'love' have? It can have a thousand and one meanings, and it can have a thousand and one meanings because it has no meaning in itself. It depends on the user and the context.

A man says to a woman, "I love you." And another man says, "I love ice-cream." Is the meaning the same? And Jesus says, "Love is God." When Jesus says, "Love is God," and you say, "I love ice-cream, " is the meaning the same? Then God's taste will be the taste of ice-cream. No, it is not.

The meaning of the word depends on the context. And the context is a huge phenomenon. In the context, the person who has made the statement is deeply involved. If he is a man of presence, his presence is involved. If he is a Buddha or a Christ, if he is a Sufi, then all that he has known and seen is involved in it. Don't take statements of Buddhas ordinarily. Till you have understood the quality of the Buddha, his mindfulness, his awareness, you will go on misunderstanding. And whatsoever you will do out of your misunderstanding will create more misery, complexity, turmoil, in your life. Rather than becoming a blessing, it will become a curse. That's what has happened to humanity at large.

Millions are there who are Christians, and they don't know what Christ-consciousness is, and they go on reading the Bible. And millions are there who are Buddhists, and they don't know what Buddha-consciousness is, and they go on reading the Diamond Sutra. And millions are there who are Hindus, and they don't know what Krishna-consciousness is, and they go on reading the Gita.

Hence the confusion in the world. Hence so much stupidity in the world, unintelligence in the world, mediocrity in the world.

People read the Sermon on the Mount, or the Bible, or the Gita, or the Dhammapada, but the meaning? - the meaning is going to be yours. Meaning cannot be that of Jesus or Krishna or Mohammed Always remember: when you are reading the Bible, be very conscious, cautious, that it is your meaning that you are reading there. You cannot read what Jesus means. You can read that only when you have attained something of Jesus' self remembering.

THIS IS THE KEY-WORD IN SUFISM: self-remembering. It is not a doctrine; it is a discipline. It is not magic, ritual; it is science, it is REAL psychology. That is the literal meaning of the word 'psychology': the science of the soul. The Western psychology has no right to call itself psychology; it is not the science of the soul. On the contrary, it denies the existence of the soul. It is so absurd to call it psychology. It only studies the behavior - and not even the behavior of man, but the behavior of rats, to understand the behavior of man. It reduces man to rats. Rats have the keys: it thinks if you can understand the rat and the rat's mind you will be able to understand man and man's mind.

In the East we have thought just the diametrically polar opposite: unless you understand a Buddha, you will not understand man. Just see the difference. Skinner says if we can understand the mind of the rat we will be able to understand the mind of man. Man is nothing but a little more complicated rat. The rat is simple, can be understood more easily. Hence the obsession of the psychologists to study the rat.

The Eastern psychology, which is REALLY psychology, says unless you understand Buddha you will not understand man - because man is just a seed. How can you understand the seed unless you have seen a tree? fully grown, with foliage, with flowers, with fruits? Unless the seed has manifested itself totally and has come to be actual, is not only potential, you will not be able to understand it. If you want to understand the seed, go and study the tree. By studying the tree you will know what the seed is and what the seed can be.

In the East we understand Buddha to understand man. In the West you understand rats to understand man. This is humiliating. This is insulting.

Western psychology is not psychology yet. It should drop the name! It is only a study of outer behavior, but not of the inner consciousness. It denies that there is anything inner.

Sufism is psychology in the true sense of the word. It depends on the inner. But then one problem arises: when you listen to the statements of the Sufis, be very alert. Don't translate them according to YOUR understanding, otherwise you will miss the import. Rather than bringing the statements of the Sufis to your understanding, you will have to rise in your awareness and go closer to the Sufis.

These are the two ways to understand.

For example, you are here with me. One way is: whatsoever I say, you translate it, reduce it, to YOUR understanding. That is one way to understand it. In fact, it is a way of misunderstanding it.

The other way is the right way to understand: when you fall in love with something that I say, then try to come closer to my awareness. Then meditate more. Then become more self-aware. Then witnessing has to be grown. Then more energy has to be poured into observation, so that you can rise a little higher from your ordinary plane of understanding. Then you will be able to see the point.

The problem becomes very complicated because Sufis use very simple language. You can understand it. As far as language is concerned there is no problem. But as far as the MESSAGE IS concerned, there is a great problem. The statements of the Sufis are coded messages - simple on the surface but carrying great treasure in them.

Sufism is not a doctrine, hence it is not intellectual. It is existential. It is total. Intellect is only a tiny part. But somehow this calamity has happened, that the intellect has become dictatorial, that it has usurped all the power that you have, that it has become totalitarian, that it has become the master.

Sufis say the intellect is a great servant, a good servant, very useful, but a bad master. It can't be the master.

In fact, no PART can be the master. Neither can the heart be the master. Neither the hands nor the feet, nor the kidneys, nor the lungs - NO PART can be the master. The mastery belongs to the organic unity. Man's being should be a democracy in which every part has its say, and where every part functions at its maximum, is not hindered. end out of the harmony of all the parts arises self-remembering.

So one thing to be reminded of: Zen is anti-intellectual; it is not so with Sufism. Zen is irrational; it is not so with Sufism. Sufism is a very balanced view. It is neither intellectual nor anti intellectual ; it is neither rational nor irrational.

Sufism says: Intellect has its own place; it is a good machine. It has to be used, but only as a machine. The machine has not to become a master. This vision of man functioning as an organic unity is one of the greatest contributions to human consciousness from Sufism. Neither the heart nor the head nor anything else has to become the boss. There is no need for any boss in your being.

All have to function; nobody's functioning has to be hindered.

And out of the harmony of all the parts functioning arises that great grace called self-remembering.

It is neither of the mind nor of the soul nor of the body, but of all. It is a trinity. It is total.

Zen is a little bit extremist. It goes from intellect to the diametrically opposite extreme. Sufism is far more balanced, moderate. It remains in the middle. It says there is no need to take any standpoint.

Use all that God has given to you, but use it in such a way, in such an artful way, that your life becomes an orchestra. And the melody that will come out of that orchestra is self-remembering.

That self-remembering reveals to you all the mysteries there are. Intellect has a part to play; intellect has to serve. Its contribution is significant, for two reasons. One: while you are moving on the path, intellect helps you to avoid the falls. Intellect cannot deliver you the truth - it is too big, it is beyond intellect. It is the capacity of the total only. But intellect can still do some great work, spade work.

It can show you what is false, it can show you what is wrong. It can show you where not to go. It can help you eliminate. And that is great work. When you are standing at a crossroad and there are four roads, three have to be eliminated - intellect will do that. It cannot absolutely say to you, "This is true. Follow this." It cannot directly guide you, but it can say to you, "This does not seem to be true." Why? Because intellect's whole capacity is that of doubt. Its function is that of doubt. It can doubt! So it can show you what is false. It cannot trust, so it cannot show you what is right, but in an indirect way, if the false is eliminated you are coming closer to the true.

When ALL that is false is eliminated, and only that which is truth is left, intellect becomes silent. If it is not the master, it becomes silent. If it is the master, it goes on repeating the old gramophone saying, "This is false, this is false...." If it is just a slave, then it goes on saying, "This is false, this is false, this is false," and a moment comes when it faces the truth... it simply remains silent. It cannot say, "This is true." That is not the capacity of the intellect. But when the intellect is silent you can move on to the truth.

To find a real Master you will have to use your intellect. There is nothing else that you can use. And this is the way to use it: don't allow it to be your master. It is a beautiful computer, bio-computer, very delicate, very complex, of immense value. Millions of years have been wasted by nature to create it - don't just throw it in the dustbin. Use it! Its capacity to doubt, its skepticism, is of immense value.

Descartes started his philosophical inquiries with doubt. He made it a point that "Unless I find something which is indubitable I will not believe in anything." Everything was eliminated: God was eliminated, heaven and hell were eliminated, angels, Devil, all were eliminated... the whole of theology was eliminated. But then he came across one thing: one's own existence - how can you doubt it? Intellect becomes silent. You cannot doubt your own existence, because even to doubt it, you are needed. If I say I am not, I am falsifying my own statement. If I am not then who is making this statement?

There is a famous Sufi story:

Mulla Nasrudin was sitting in the coffee house, and bragging, as was his habit, about everything.

And he suddenly said, "There is nobody more generous than me."

And friends said, "Nasrudin, this is too much! We have never seen any generosity in you. You have not even asked once for us to come to your home even for a cup of tea - what kind of generosity are you talking about?"

He said, "Come, you all - the whole coffee house is invited to my house! I am going to give you a feast tonight. Everybody is invited, come all!"

He was so excited that he forgot all about his wife. The closer they came to home, the more his senses came back. He began feeling afraid. The whole day he had not been to the house. "The wife must' be angry!" In fact, he had gone to purchase vegetables in the morning. She must be in a rage by now. And now, not only is he coming without vegetables but with thirty people!

Just in front of the house, he said to his friends, "Wait. You are all married people, you know, you understand. Let me go in first. Let me persuade my wife."

They understood, they waited. Half an hour passed, one hour passed. It was getting late and they were feeling hungry. They said, "What is the matter?" So they knocked on the door.

Mulla said to his wife, "I have been a fool. I don't know what madness took possession of me. I was just talking by the way about my generosity and I got into this stupidity, and I have invited these people. Now there is only one way: when they knock, you just go out and tell them that Mulla is not at home."

But the wife said, "You have come with them and they know."

Mulla said, "That I will take care of. You just go."

So the wife went out. She said, "What are you waiting for? Are you looking for Mulla Nasrudin? He is not at home."

They said, "This is too much. He had come with us! Thirty witnesses - he has gone in and we have not seen him going out either. He must be in!"

But the wife said, "He is not in. You go home!"

But they started arguing and Mulla was hiding behind, and when the argument became too much and he saw that the wife is being defeated in the argument, he forgot. He came out and he said, "Listen! He may have come with you, but there is a back door too - he may have gone by the back door. So what is the point of arguing?"

Now, he himself is saying that he may have gone by the back door. You cannot say "I am not" - you cannot say "I am not at home." That will defeat your whole purpose. To say "I am not," you are needed.

Descartes stumbled upon the fact - the fact of I-amness is indubitable, it cannot be doubted. He found here intellect be-coming silent. The intellect cannot do anything. Doubt is not possible, because to doubt is to prove.

Intellect has to be used, Sufis say, but as a slave not as a master. Then, when it confronts truth, it falls silent. This is one, and the first, purpose of intellect.

The second purpose is: when you have found the truth, it is through the intellect that there is some possibility to share it with others. When you have found it, it is through the intellect that you can devise methods, techniques, situations, so that others can also be led into it.

Intellect is not the enemy - it can be used. Before attainment it can be helpful in rejecting the false; after attainment it can be helpful in indicating the truth, hinting at the truth - it can become a finger pointing to the moon.

So remember, Sufis are not against intellect, not at all. But still, don't forget: intellect has not to be the master of the house. Nobody has to be the master of the house. Your whole unity has to function in harmony. And then when there is nobody master in you, the real Master descends. That is God.

If you have a master of your own, it prevents the real Master from coming in. It may be the intellect, it may be the heart, it may be logic, it may be faith - anything - but if you have a master of your own, the true Master will not be able to enter in you. There is no space for the true Master to come in.

And the true Master is only one: the true Master is God.

NOW THIS BEAUTIFUL STORY.... Before I go into the story, zone thing more: these are not historical facts, these are parables. Don't start thinking about these stories as if they have happened.

Why am I reminding you of it? Because just the other day, Ashoka wrote a letter to me.

We were. discussing one story, one of the most beautiful Sufi stories, about the dervish who asked the king to fill his begging bowl "... to prove that you are really a king. If you cannot even fill the begging bowl of a poor beggar, what kind of king are you? and what sovereignty are you talking about?"

Gold coins were poured in, but it was a miraculous begging bowl, a magic begging bowl. All that was poured in disappeared immediately, and the bowl remained as empty as ever. The Sufi showed a great truth.

This begging bowl is the desiring mind of man. You can go on filling it, you can fill it with all the kingdoms of the world, and they will disappear, and the desiring bowl will remain empty. Even Alexanders die empty, Napoleons die empty, Adolf Hitlers die like beggars. Only those who have understood the futility of desiring die like kings. They also live like kings. A Buddha lives like a king.

That was why Jesus was so much misunderstood - because he declared himself the king, the real king. And he told his disciples, "I have come to bring the kingdom of God onto the earth."

The politicians became very much afraid: "Is he a competitor or something?" They thought, "He is gathering an army, sooner or later he will declare himself to be the king." He was talking of a totally different kind of kingdom! He was not talking of the kingdom of this world: he was tasking of the kingdom that comes when desiring disappears.

Yes, there have been kings, a Buddha, a Christ - but they were not kings in the ordinary sense in which you use the word.

And the Sufi was showing to that sovereign the futility of all that he had, the utter futility of all his possessions. Our possessions are made of the stuff called dream. They disappeared in the bowl.

It was one of the most beautiful parables - but a parable, remember. It did not happen actually like that. But Ashoka wrote a letter to me. He is infatuated with magic. Because of that, he had lived for many years with Satya Sai Baba, thinking that there must be truth when a man can produce, out of nowhere, Swiss wrist watches, gold coins, holy ash - there must be something great. He has come to me, he has become a sannyasin, he is growing every day, but Satya Sai Baba seems to be a chronic disease in him. Somehow it goes on lingering; he cannot miss an opportunity. And he is growing, and he is going beautifully well. I am perfectly happy. But that old mind goes on protecting itself somewhere in the nooks and corners.

The day that whole old mind goes, he will have an experience of satori. I am waiting for that day.

Listening to this parable, he jumped upon it. He said, "You praised this Sufi so much who did this magical thing with his begging bowl - he helped gold coins disappear. You appreciated this man so much. Why do you condemn Satya Sai Baba? Because he does the opposite: he creates gold coins out of nothing. This Sufi did the opposite: he allowed the gold coins to disappear into nothing.

Both are doing the same thing from different corners, from different ends. You appreciated this Sufi so much, and you condemn Satya Sai Baba - why?"

First, this is a parable. There has never been such a man who has done it. Secondly, to help people see that their gold is nothing but dream stuff, that it disappears into nothingness, is to help them towards spirituality. And to give people illusions that gold can be produced out of nothingness is to force them more and more into the world.

This Sufi dervish was helping the king to see the futility of all his possessions. Satyr Sai Baba is simply helping poor people to have desires for gold, is simply helping people to become more worldly, materialistic. The people who have surrounded Satya Sai Baba are materialists. You cannot find a spiritual person there. Why should a spiritual person go there? For what? A spiritual person is not interested in magic, is not interested in occult powers, is not interested in gold either. A spiritual person is finished with all these things! Hence he is spiritual. His search is for something that is beyond death. His search is for self-remembering.

Satyr Sai Baba cannot produce self-remembering out of nothing. Nobody can produce it. Self- remembering has to be created by each individual on his own. It is an arduous journey, a great pilgrimage.

First, the Sufi story is a parable. I am not saying that this is a historical fact. Secondly, Satya Sai Baba's work is very worldly, trivial, profane; it has nothing to do with the sacred, it has nothing sacred in it. The people who become interested are people who are poor and are searching for some means to become rich, or people who are ill and are searching for some means to become healthy, or people who are crippled, paralyzed, blind, this and that.... But the search is not spiritual.

The spiritual search is not for the outer eyes but the inner. And the spiritual search is not for the outer health but for the inner wholeness.

In a poor country like India, people like Satya Sai Baba can gather a crowd. People are poor and people are hankering for things - but you will not find spiritual people there. That is a totally different dimension.

Remember about all these Sufi stories: they are only parables. They indicate something, they symbolize something. They have a message, but don't take them as facts, not as historical facts.

The parable:

A CERTAIN SUFI TEACHER WAS EXPLAINING HOW A FALSE SUFI HAD BEEN UNMASKED.

"A REAL SUFI SENT ONE OF HIS DISCIPLES TO SERVE HIM. THE DISCIPLE WAITED ON THE IMPOSTOR HAND AND FOOT, DAY AND NIGHT. PRESENTLY EVERYONE BEGAN TO SEE HOW THE FRAUD LOVED THESE ATTENTIONS, AND PEOPLE DESERTED HIM UNTIL HE WAS COMPLETELY ALONE."

THE SUFI TEACHER HAS TO EXPOSE THOSE WHO ARE FALSE.

The Master's work consists in that - that the false has to be exposed. People write to me: "Why do you expose Satya Sai Baba? or Muktananda, or Shivananda? Why?" The false has to be exposed.

The more you know about the false, the better you will be equipped to understand the real and the true.

And the mind can understand the false more easily. Once the mind has understood what is false, it becomes more and more easy for you to move into the direction of truth. Otherwise there are a thousand and one false doors, and one can go on knocking on doors and wasting one's time.

A CERTAIN SUFI TEACHER WAS EXPLAINING HOW A FALSE SUFI HAD BEEN UNMASKED.

Who is a false Sufi? One who pretends. One who has no presence yet. One who has not yet overflowing love in his being. One who still hankers for others to love him. One who wants attention.

Try to understand this.

Why do you want attention? Because you are empty. If the husband is not giving attention to the wife, she becomes angry. If the husband comes home and the wife is not giving attention to him, he gets into a rage. Why is there so much hankering for attention? Why do you want so much attention for yourself? Because you are empty. Deep down, you are so poor that if nobody is paying attention to you, you start feeling as if you don't exist at all. Your whole existence depends on people's attention.

This is the root cause of politics; this is how a politician is born. Politics is nothing but a strategy to attract attention. The politician is the poorest man in the world, because he needs thousands and thousands of people and their attention, and constantly - only then can he live. That is his food, his nourishment. He devours people's attentions. Any way, right or wrong, the attention is needed.

And that is the cause of all crime in the world. Politicians and criminals are not very different people.

Psychologically the same type. The politician is trying ways which are acceptable to the society, and the criminal, in his desperation, has started trying ways which are not acceptable to the society.

A man in America killed seven persons, for no reason at all. Strangers! Just went on the beach and shot seven people. He had not met them before. He had not even seen their faces. He was asked in the court "Why?"

He said, "I wanted my picture on the first pages of the newspapers. And I am happy! Now I am somebody. Everybody knows about me. I am not dying as a nobody. You can give me any punishment - death is acceptable - but I had lived long enough as a nobody. I would have passed and nobody would have paid attention - now everybody knows that I exist, that I am important."

Go deep into the criminal's mind and you will find this. And this is the mind of the politician too. If the politician succeeds slowly slowly he becomes criminal. The more powerful he becomes, the more criminal he becomes. He is saintly only when he is out of power. His saintliness is only when he is powerless. Once he is powerful he does not care; then he starts doing all those things he has always been against.

But everybody is a politician in that sense. If you hanker for attention, watch - you have some politics in you. And politics is poison. If you pass through a street and nobody says hello to you, nobody says good morning, nobody looks at you, how do you feel? A nonentity. It hurts. If it hurts it shows only one thing: that you don't have any self-awareness. Otherwise there is no need!

The man of self-awareness can live absolutely alone and utterly happy. He can move in the crowd and he will not think even for a single moment that anybody should pay attention to him. In fact, he would like nobody to pay attention to him, so that he can go on doing his thing without any interference from people.

A real Sufi has such presence that he does not ask for attention. The unreal Sufi can be immediately judged if he asks for attention.

A CERTAIN SUFI TEACHER WAS EXPLAINING HOW A FALSE SUFI HAD BEEN UNMASKED.

"A REAL SUFI SENT ONE OF HIS DISCIPLES TO SERVE HIM. THE DISCIPLE WAITED ON THE IMPOSTOR HAND AND FOOT, DAY AND NIGHT. PRESENTLY EVERYONE BEGAN TO SEE HOW THE FRAUD LOVED THESE ATTENTIONS, AND PEOPLE DESERTED HIM UNTIL HE WAS COMPLETELY ALONE."

Seeing this, that he loved attentions being paid to him, people deserted him. The story must concern people of great understand I g It is an ancient parable. People knew in the old days what it is to be really religious.

The really religious is ego less. The really religious is overflowing with love. He is not a beggar for love or attention. The really religious is one who has effaced himself completely, who has become absent. And when a person becomes absent, God becomes present in him. The more you are absent as you, the more God will be present in you.

A simple device: a disciple was sent to the bogus teacher and told to serve him so much so that the bogus teacher became almost dependent. And people just seeing this disappeared. It was a totally different world. People knew what religious consciousness is all about.

ONE OF THE LISTENERS TO THIS STORY SAID TO HIMSELF, "WHAT A MARVELOUS IDEA! I SHALL GO AWAY AND DO JUST THE SAME THING."

NOW THIS MAN is getting interested in exposing somebody. The one side of the illness is that somebody wants atten-tion, importance, superiority, ego-fulfillment. The other side of the story is that others would like to expose him. Why should this man be interested in exposing anybody?

Listening to the story from the Master, he didn't become in-terested in the Master himself, he didn't become interested in the search for a real Sufi. He became interested, on the contrary, in going somewhere and finding a bogus divine and exposing him. What are you going to gain out of it? And who ARE you?

If a real Master decides to expose somebody, that's a totally different matter. It is out of compassion - out of compassion for the people the fraud is deceiving. And out of compassion for the fraud too - because when you deceive others, you are being deceived yourself too. When a real Master exposes somebody, it is not out of anger. It is not out of enmity: it is out of compassion.

It is reported:

Mahavir had a disciple, his name was Goshalak. He was an impostor. He learnt things from Mahavir.

He was there just to learn a &w things so he could become a Master on his own. Out of compassion, Mahavir continued to teach him - knowing his mind perfectly well, his devious, cunning mind, he continued to teach him.

Then one day he disappeared and declared himself a Perfect Master. Mahavir laughed. He said, "This is strange, because he is not yet even an imperfect disciple! What to say of becoming a Perfect Master."

Out of compassion, Mahavir travel led to that town where Goshalak had declared himself. He went to see the man and he said, "Goshalak, what are you doing?"

But see how people are. Goshalak was so cunning, he said, "Who are you? I have never seen you."

He had lived twelve years with Mahavir, and Mahavir says, "You have not seen me? And twelve years you lived with me?"

And Goshalak said, "Look! This man thinks he has attained and he cannot understand a simple phenomenon. Yes, the body is the same, but that soul has left. And now God has descended in me.

He is using Goshalak's body as a vehicle to bring real religion into the world."

People can be very cunning. Mahavir could not believe his eyes, that somebody can be so cunning.

And this man deceived many people. But how long can you deceive? Finally, at the last moment, his whole life's story became too heavy on him. And in the last moment he declared. "I am false. I am the same man who used to be Mahavir's disciple. I have been deceiving people - I don't know a thing. Before I die I want it to be known that I was false. Please forgive me, and go to Mahavir. I cannot go now, I am so ill, but I would like to fall at his feet and apologize. It is too late, but I have deceived."

There is a great desire in people to claim. And the inner riches can be claimed more easily, because to disprove it is very difficult.

A real Master exposes the unreal out of compassion - compassion for the people he is deceiving and compassion for him too, because he is also wasting his life. But this should not be the business of one who has not yet known anything.

ONE OF THE LISTENERS TO THIS STORY SAID TO HIMSELF. "WHAT A MARVELOUS IDEA!"

Just see: what is said and what is heard are totally different things. People go on hearing what they can hear.

All the girls from the office poured into a crowded cafeteria for the coffee break. One of the girls lit a cigarette and blew ring after ring of smoke. An elderly lady sitting next to her was supremely alloyed.

"Miss," she said, "that smoke is a horrible habit. I would rather commit adultery than smoke."

"So would I," answered the girl, "but, you know, there just isn't time during a coffee break."

People hear what they CAN hear.

A man walked into a psychiatrist's office and stuffed tobacco into his right ear.

"Well, it's obvious that you need me," said the doctor.

"I sure do," the man agreed. "Get a match?"

Never for a single moment believe that you hear that which is said to you. It is very rare, just coincidental that sometimes you hear that which is said to you. Because you have a set mind! and that set mind is there to interpret it.

Roberts became convinced he was a cannibal, and his wife finally persuaded him to visit a psychiatrist.

When Roberts returned home after his first visit, his wife asked, "So tell me, what is a fancy psychiatrist like?"

"Delicious!" beamed Roberts.

Everybody has a set mind, and you hear from the mind. Unless you learn how to hear, without the mind, how to put the mind aside, you will go on hearing that which has not been said to you.

Now, the Master is saying, "Don't be deceived by frauds." He is not saying, "Go and expose frauds."

But this man says, "What a marvelous idea!" He got hooked with the idea. It appealed to him - just the idea to expose somebody. Just the idea to prove that somebody is a fraud, just the idea to torture somebody, just the idea to make somebody feel inferior can give you great joy - the joy of torture, violence, sadism.

"I SHALL GO AWAY AND DO JUST THE SAME THING."

And how can he do just the same thing? He is not being sent by a Sufi Master: he is going on his own. He is not a Sufi! He does not understand a thing - what it is all about, who is a real Master and who is a fraud. Out of context he has taken something.

He tried, he worked hard:

HE WENT TO WHERE A BOGUS DIVINE WAS TO BE FOUND, AND PASSIONATELY DESIRED TO BE ENROLLED AS A DISCIPLE. AFTER THREE YEARS, SUCH WAS HIS DEVOTION THAT HUNDREDS OF DEVOTEES HAD COLLECTED. "THIS SAGE MUST INDEED BE A GREAT MAN,"

THEY SAID TO ONE ANOTHER, "TO INSPIRE SUCH LOYALTY AND SELF-SACRIFICE IN HIS DISCIPLE."

Now, just the opposite happened. Life is very delicate. Unless you move in the right context, you may do the SAME thing but the results may be just the opposite. What actually happened?

For three years he served the Master so obediently that he created the impression in people that if a man can create so much obedience in a certain disciple, such sacrifice, then he must be a great Master. He missed the who!e point.

In the story, the true Sufi had sent a disciple to play a role, to act: "Act as if you are paying attention to the Master, the false Master. And let him become dependent, more and more dependent on your attentions. And let people see how much he hankers for attention."

In the second case, just the opposite happened. This man was not aware of what he was doing. He thought he had to serve devotedly. He served! But his service proved to people that this is possible only if there is a real Master, otherwise how can a man for three years serve so deeply and remain so intimate, so close by? Thousands gathered!

SO THE MAN WENT BACK TO THE SUFI FROM WHOM HE HAD HEARD THE STORY AND EXPLAINED WHAT HAD HAPPENED.

The emphasis is different. In the first, the emphasis was to create a need in the bogus Master; in the second, the emphasis was to serve and be as obedient as possible. The whole thing went topsy turvy . He was angry, of course - three years wasted. Not only wasted, but he became an instrument in gathering thousands of people to a bogus divine.

SO HE WENT BACK TO THE SUFI FROM WHOM HE HAD HEARD THE STORY AND EXPLAINED WHAT HAD HAPPENED. " YOUR TALES ARE NOT RELIABLE," HE SAID, "BECAUSE WHEN I TRIED TO PUT ONE OF THEM INTO PRACTICE, THE REVERSE HAPPENED."

METHODS DON'T MEAN A THING. Techniques don t mean a thing. All that matters is the inner awareness with which you work on them.

For example: in the East, for centuries, MANTRA has been used as a technique. And now Maharishi Mahesh Yogi has introduced the same technique into the West, with a SLIGHT difference - but that slight difference is so big that it has destroyed the whole method.

In the East we have used mantra, but the condition is: one should not get LOST into the mantra.

You repeat Ram or Krishna or AUM or Allah or any word - your own name will do - you repeat AUM, AUM, AUM, but you are not to be lost in the repetition. You have to remain a witness. You have to go on watching this sound AUM, AUM, AUM, and you have to remain there a witness, a watcher on the hills.

If you are not there as a witness, then this repetition of AUM and AUM will be just a lullaby. It will give you a good sleep. Nothing is wrong with good sleep, but it will not give you awakening.

It is not accidental that Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's transcendental meditation is known in the West as 'non-medical tranquilizer'. That's exactly what it is. It is GOOD to give you sleep, but it is not good to make you awake. And spirituality is wakefulness, it is not a good sleep.

A good sleep is good in itself. Physiologically good, psychologically good, but it has no spiritual dimension. The spiritual dimension opens when you become wakeful. A real meditator, even while asleep, remains awake. That's what's said by Krishna in the Gita: "When the whole world sleeps, the yogi is still awake." Not that he sits in SIDDHASANA and goes on chanting Rama, Rama, Rama - he ALSO sleeps, but only his body sleeps, his psychological mechanism sleeps, but his awareness burns bright.

Now the method is of immense value. But with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's interpretation it has lost all value. It has become just a gimmick, a technique, to help people - a little relaxation. But it is no longer spiritual. It is not meditation, it is not transcendental either. Just a SLIGHT difference, and all changes.

"YOUR TALES ARE NOT RELIABLE," SAID THE MAN, "BECAUSE WHEN I TRIED TO PUT ONE INTO PRACTICE, THE REVERSE HAPPENED."

"ALAS," SAID THE SUFI, "THERE WAS ONLY ONE THING WRONG WITH YOUR ATTEMPT TO APPLY SUFI METHODS. YOU WERE NOT A SUFI."

If you really want to understand what Sufism is you will have to become a Sufi. If you want to know what to be a Christian is, you will have to become a Christ - less than that won't do. And the misery is, as Friedrich Nietzsche says: The first and the last Christian died on the cross. And that has happened to all the great Masters.

People become imitators. When you come in close contact with a Buddha, don't become a Buddhist - become a Buddha. When you come close to a Sufi Master, don't become a Sufist - become a Sufi. And the only way to know is to become.

Just the other day somebody asked... the woman who has asked must be a seeker. She has been asking many questions. I have not been answering. I am waiting for the right moment. She is not yet part of my being. Her questions are right, but I don't answer questions: I answer questioners. I have been avoiding.

Just the other day she asked: "Can't I become a follower without becoming a disciple? Can't I become a follower without becoming a sannyasin?" There is no way. Then you will be just an outsider, a spectator. You have to be colored in my being. You have to come as close as possible.

The change of the clothes is not significant - it is only a gesture. It is a gesture that shows that you are ready, that even if your being has to be dyed into some new color, you are ready. You show the gesture! By changing the name you simply show that "I am ready to become discontinuous from my past," that "I am ready to renounce my past," that "I am ready to take a jump into the future, into the unknown." That "I trust you," that "I am ready to go with you wherever you are going." That "I will not ask any promise, any guarantee." That "I am ready to go on this adventure. This risk appeals to me."

You can be here. You can listen to me without being part of me, but then you will listen in your own way, you will interpret it in your own way. And sometimes it will happen: you may even practice it, but in your own way, and the result will be the reverse. Then don't be angry at me. Don't say that the reverse effect has come, that I was saying something else and something else has happened. It has to happen in the total context.

A few people come to me and they say, "Here we cannot do the dynamic meditation. It looks so crazy." Particularly Indians, if they are on high posts, they feel afraid.

A few days before, a political leader was here, a minister. He said, "Just teach me. I will do it in my home. I cannot do it here, because if people see me dancing, shouting, what will they think? And I have to think of the voters too. And if in the newspapers pictures go... screaming and shouting and jumping, I am gone! I will do it at my home."

I can understand his problem - but in his home he will do it according to his own way. He will make slight changes in it so that the neighbors cannot hear, so the wife does not get too much disturbed, so the children don't think that daddy has gone mazy. He will change here and there; he will make something out of it - but then the result will be totally different, sometimes even the reverse. And then he will think that I have given something wrong to him.

This is my field! When you do something here, you are doing it in the right context. It is an energy field. You are not alone: hundreds of other people are doing it. You can ride on the wave. You can reach to heights you will never reach alone. Here I am available; here you can trust that nothing will go wrong. At your home, doing meditation alone, you will become afraid; you can become very much afraid. The fear can take grip of you - the fear of going mad, berserk, or something.

Here, become a sannyasin, be part of me, drown in me, let me be drowned in you. Be a Sufi if you want to know what Sufism is. There is no other way. The only way to know is to be - AND in the right context, in the right reference, in the right situation.

I am creating a situation here. This is an Al chemical field. This is not an ordinary ashram. This is a scientific lab. People are being transformed. People are moving into new dimensions, taking quantum leaps, arriving into new spaces. You cannot watch these things from the outside.

And don't be a fool: don't watch and don't think that back home you will try to do it. The reverse effect is possible. And then don't throw the responsibility on me. Become part of me if it appeals to you. A great door is open... enter into it.

The Master said:

"ALAS, THERE WAS ONLY ONE THING WRONG WITH YOUR ATTEMPT TO APPLY SUFI METHODS. YOU WERE NOT A SUFI."

If you want to apply my methods, be a sannyasin, so that I will not have to say some day to you:

Alas, there was only one thing wrong with your attempt to apply sannyas methods - you were not a sannyasin.