Part One: The Spiritual Preceptor and the Disciple
A. THE ESSENCE OF THE GURU-DISCIPLE RELATIONSHIP
Discipleship is a golden key to blessedness if the disciple enables the guru to live and manifest through his personality and life. The light of the guru should shine through the disciple every moment of his living, wakeful life. Then, indeed, every moment the disciple will move forward and benefit himself. He will be the gainer and progress towards the great Goal. This is the truth about true discipleship—that one makes oneself a centre in and through which the guru manifests and shines.
3. THE HEART OF THE GURU
We are now approaching the great annual day of worship of those who bring light to dispel the darkness of spiritual ignorance in our interior, who take us from unrealities to the Reality, who enable us to go beyond the ever-recurring, revolving wheel of birth and death into that realm of everlasting, rebirthless life. The celebration of Guru Purnima pays homage to those beings, those great ones, who having reached that abode, having liberated themselves forever, have turned back and engaged themselves in illumining others, in liberating others.
What is in the heart of these great teachers? Why do they act and engage themselves in ceaseless work when they have no motivation for acting, having fulfilled all that has to be fulfilled? They have done everything that has to be done, attained everything that has to be attained. They have no more wishes, no more desires, no more wants, no more intentions, no more sankalpas.
They thus revel in a state of supreme satisfaction, contentment, for they know that there is nothing more for them to do. Their hearts are full; they desire nothing. And so, if the Lord were to place before them the bounty of all His countless millions of universes and say, “Take this,” they will reply: “Keep them, for You have blessed me in a far greater manner. You have taken away from me the shackles of desire. You have graced me with the supreme gift of perfect desirelessness, perfect contentment, perfect fulfilment. What greater blessing can you offer me, O Lord?”
What could be the motivation for such beings to continue to act when there is no longer any need to act—when they have attained everything and are in a state of supreme plenitude and peace? What does the Indian spiritual genius have to say about the heart of these great ones? It says that if at all one could attribute to them any desire—if you want an explanation from your point of view—then you can say that they do have one thought, one intention, one desire, and that is that all sincere seeking souls who are in quest of the Goal Supreme may attain that goal, that they may be in the same state in which they are.
With that one urge from within—a spontaneous urge not arising out of mind, intellect, thought, feeling, emotion or sentiment, because they are established in a state totally beyond, transcending, all these—there is a spontaneous intention of supreme love and goodwill that all may be established in the great state that they have attained by the grace of the Supreme. That is the only intention with which they act.
And, therefore, when that is the one urge that moves them to act, the least that we can do is to strive to the best of our ability to become like them, to approximate the ideal that they have placed before us by their own ideal life—to respond to their call, to become liberated here and now in this very life, not in the distant future, not in some post-mortem life, but now, here, so that even while in this body we are yet a liberated being, a jivanmukta.
That indeed would be the highest Guru Purnima worship, the highest expression of devotion to the guru. Therefore, striving with all earnestness, all sincerity, ceaselessly try to be like them, aspire to be like them and pray to them: “By my own effort and intention, this will never be possible, because of all my weaknesses, drawbacks and imperfections. May you, therefore, out of your infinite grace, complete it, make it full and whole.”
And, they are ready to do it. The great spiritual master, Paramahamsa Ramakrishna, said: “Even if you do one sixteenth of whatever sadhana has been done through this body of mine that will be more than enough. You will attain perfection. You will become a liberated being. You will go beyond all sorrow. You will be established in a state of joy and bliss.”
Therefore, let us all be in a state of oneness, let us all join together and collectively make our life a sincere, earnest and grateful response to this great and glorious urge that makes these perfect beings wish to bestow the same perfection upon others, the urge that makes them continue to engage themselves in this great work of awakening the human world into a state of higher awareness of their divine destiny.
Be it so! Let this be your highest worship, highest devotion. Then, verily, Guru Purnima will not merely be a religious day upon the outer secular earth plane of your life, but it will be a great spiritual landmark, a spiritual turning point in your interior unto satchidananda-consciousness. That is what life ought to be, and by the grace of God and the loving benedictions of Gurudev, may it be so! God bless you!
4. GURU-BHAKTI
God is an unknown entity. God is an unseen entity. However, with absolutely irrefutable logic, rational argument and reason, Vedanta establishes the fact of God. And through analysis we can infer, “Yes, there must be a God; it stands to reason. It is irrational to suppose that there cannot be such a thing as God. There must be.” And scriptures also tell us that He is a Being who is sacred, who is holy, all-pure, noble and sublime. But, nevertheless, God is still for us only a concept of the mind. We have not seen God. We have not touched, nor tasted, nor smelt Him. We’ve only heard about Him. We can only infer Him. We can only imagine Him.
But then, if we are able to see in a human individual manifestations of holiness, of sanctity, of purity, of sublimity, of nobility, of goodness, of loftiness of conduct, character, nature, sentiment, thought, feeling and action, if we see something out of the ordinary—something extraordinary, something special, a manifestation of those qualities that we have been taught to associate only with God—then we say: “If such a human being can exist, God must exist. Otherwise, from whence do these qualities come which we do not normally see in anyone?” When we see this divinity, this holiness, this sanctity, we begin to realise: “Yes, God I have not seen, but godliness I have seen. All the qualities attributed to God by the scriptures, by saints and sages, in all religious contexts—those I see in an unusual measure, in an extraordinary measure, in this being. Because I have seen this being and this being is known to me, I am assured that God is. I know there must be a God.” And in the Vedic tradition the guru is such a being. The guru becomes for us pratyaksha devata, visible God. God reveals Himself through the guru.
The guru thus becomes the linking factor, a channel for putting the wandering, lost jivatma, the individual Soul, back into contact with its source, God, the Universal Soul. And just as the guru is a channel for the jivatma to re-link itself with the paramatma, even so, if we can create a channel between ourselves and our guru, then that channel will become the effecting means of receiving from the guru guru-kripa, all that the guru is—the knowledge of the guru, the sanctity of the guru, the purity of the guru, the spirituality of the guru.
And that channel is called guru-bhakti. That is why the significant verse in the Svetasvatara Upanishad: “yasya deve para bhaktih yatha deve tatha gurau, tasyaite kathita hyarthah prakasante mahatmanah—If you have supreme devotion to God and the same kind of devotion to your guru, then to you, the essence, the subtle truths of the scriptures become revealed.” Thus it is that through guru-bhakti the sadhaka, the seeker, the disciple, creates an effective link, a connection, a channel which enables the guru to share with the disciple what the guru has been endowed with from God.
So, we have to provide a way for the guru to give what he wishes to give. And that is through guru-bhakti, devotion, where there is no place for the ego. If the thought comes, “I have got great guru-bhakti,” then finished, that bhakti becomes cancelled, it is nullified.You yourself must become the very embodiment of that love, that devotion. There should be no awareness of some being, some person having that quality of devotion. Then it becomes a subtle spiritual ego. The very purpose of the existence of the guru is to remove the separatist I-consciousness, the consciousness of being a separate being or entity, and if guru-bhakti becomes a means of boosting and sustaining that abhimana (ego), ahamkara (egoism), then it loses its purpose and becomes self-defeating.
Thus true guru-bhakti is egoless, nirabhimana (without ego), vinamra (humble). Sabari was bhaktisvarupa. She had great bhakti for Rama, but she was not conscious that she was a great devotee of Rama. Neither was Hanuman conscious that he was a great bhakta of Rama. It was his very nature. He was an embodiment of devotion for Rama. The gopis of Vrindavan did not know that they were great devotees of Krishna. They said: “All we know is that He is the one object to be adored. We don’t know anything else. We cannot do anything but adore Him. We are that adoration. It is our very self. We are not different from that. Take it away from us and we will die, we will cease to exist.” They were filled with that love, not with egoistical awareness of that love.
The greater the growth of devotion and the greater the reverence for the guru, the greater is the inflow of the guru’s grace. The greater the desire to carry out the ideals and principles of the guru in life and the greater the keen eagerness and firm determination to carry out the instructions of the guru faithfully, meticulously, day after day, in one’s daily activities and life, the greater is the inflow of the guru’s grace. Gurudev was never tired of again and again reiterating: “Obedience is better than reverence.” And Vivekananda came down heavily upon mere sentiment and emotion. He said that this sentiment has ruined us. We have become backboneless; we lack a sense of purpose.
And what have the Upanishads put before us to illustrate true devotion? One disciple came to his guru as a young boy and the guru told him that it was his duty to collect firewood daily for the haven. He went on doing it without questioning. He was not allowed to cut green trees; and so the whole day, with great difficulty, he searched for and cut dry wood, put it on his head and returned only in the evening. The guru never gave him any spiritual instructions or teachings. Years went by. The disciple forgot time, until one day he realised he had become old, his hair and beard had become silver-white. Suddenly he burst into tears: “What is my fate? My whole life has passed away and the guru has not yet given me brahma-jnana.” He had become old. He had served his guru without question ever since he was a young boy. That was his devotion.
Another disciple was asked to take the guru’s cattle to pasture. He had to be with the cattle all day. The guru did not ask his wife to prepare any lunch for him, and he did not have permission to drink milk from the cows. So the whole day he went hungry, only quenching his thirst with water. Days, months, years passed this way.
And one disciple was asked to irrigate the guru’s fields. He had to let the water into the fields and make sure that it did not leak out. After working the whole day, one evening he discovered a leak in one of the earthen walls. He tried to plug it with some clay. It kept leaking. He tried all methods to repair it, and finally not knowing what else to do, he decided to plug it with his own body. So he lay down, curled himself into a ball and stopped the leak. After nightfall, when he had not returned, the guru became anxious and so with several of his disciples went searching for him. Finally they found him in his curled up position stopping the leak.
That was the type of guru-bhakti they had. It was not mere sentiment. It was true guru-bhakti. It had iron behind it. It had immense strength behind it. It had determination, sattvic determination, behind it. These are a few towering examples of guru-bhakti in our scriptures. There are many others. They come from all traditions. They are all sanketa matra (indicators) of the stuff that guru-bhakti is made of. It is divine power, it is divine force, not merely silly human sentiment, not merely emotion.
When such guru-bhakti is there towards the guru, such obedience, such great desire to carry out his behest, biddings and teachings, then illumination automatically descends from the guru to the disciple. The illumination in which the guru is established comes like a spark flying from one end of an exposed wire to another. For when the weeping old disciple was taken by the guru’s wife to the guru and explained why he was weeping, the guru replied: “What! What do you mean, you have no illumination!” Immediately, the disciple became illumined. Why? Because of his total self-effacement, total dedication, his unquestioning carrying out of the behest of the guru, because of the exemplary type of devotion that filled his heart: “I have come to a guru. I must serve him. This is my greatest good fortune.”
Thus the most effective way of deriving maximum benefit from the guru is to create a channel of lofty, sublime devotion to the guru, heroic guru-bhakti. And it is that heroic guru-bhakti where there is the greatest love and reverence combined with the highest obedience, the highest desire to please the guru by carrying out his instructions, that becomes the great channel for the inflow of guru-kripa. In that way, spiritual vision dawns and you “see” Reality, you “behold” Reality.
That is the tradition. That is the true inner dynamics of the guru sishya relationship through which the disciple is able to benefit in a maximum measure from the guru. Thus we have known from our scriptures, from our ancient bhaktas, from the narratives of ancient disciples, their relationship to their gurus. Thus we have learnt this great secret. May we all be benefited.
May the grace of all the brahma-vidya-gurus, from ancient times up to the present, be upon you. May you ponder deeply, reflect deeply, upon what an ideal disciple should be, what constitutes real discipleship, and become benefited thereby.
It is through developing proximity to Reality and then contact with Reality, that one ultimately becomes Reality. It is only through sparsa (touch), it is only through contact, that a philosopher’s stone is able to turn iron into gold. If you keep it a hair’s-breadth away, the iron will forever remain iron. No matter how powerful the philosopher’s stone is, it cannot exercise its power unless the base metal comes into actual contact with it.
This lets us into a great truth: It is in developing a living contact with a source of transforming spiritual power that one becomes illumined, one becomes divine, one becomes transformed. Thus, the way to derive maximum benefit from our guru is by connecting ourselves to him. We do it through faith, sraddha. We do it through supreme devotion, parabhakti.
Is there an additional method of contacting the guru? Yes, and one that was constantly, repeatedly reiterated by Gurudev. Gurudev said: “Obedience is better than reverence.” Devotion is good. But what is the sign of devotion? What is the practical proof that you are really devoted to the guru? It is to be sincerely, earnestly and seriously desirous of carrying out his instructions and living according to his teachings.
To walk along the path that the guru has made for us and to go in the direction he has pointed out is the sign of true love and devotion. That is bhakti. Bhakti also means seva. Bhakti means serving the guru. And what is the greatest service that one can render to the guru? Try to be like him. Try to do exactly what he has asked you to do. For this effects an even deeper contact and connection. When you are living the teachings of the guru, you are in the deepest contact with the guru, you are in the deepest state of yoga with the guru.
Guru sishya yoga is present in its highest and most intense form when the disciple makes himself the very embodiment of the teachings of the guru, the very personification of the guru upadesa (instructions), the guru ajna (orders) and the guru adesa (commands). That is why Sanjaya was able to utter the concluding sloka of the Srimad Bhagavad Gita— yatra yogesvarah krishnao yatra partho dhanur-dharah; tatra srir-vijayo bhutir-dhruva nitir-matir-mama (Wherever is Krishna, the Lord of yoga, and Arjuna, the ideal disciple, there are prosperity, victory, happiness and firm policy—such is my conviction). When the full carrying out of the ajna, upadesa and adesa of the guru is present, everything is wonderful, everything is auspicious, everything is blessed. It is certain fulfilment and victory. Everything is certain when this type of yoga between the sishya and the guru is there.
This inner fact is a very important truth that is revealed in the Gita. For in the beginning, Arjuna is the very contrary of a sishya. He says: “I will not fight.” At the outset, he even questions the correctness of the guru’s teachings, because he is in a state of ignorance. He is in a state of delusion. He is in a state of deep attachment, completely entangled by himself, in himself. He is a slave of himself. He is entangled by his own emotions, his own sentiments, his own desires, his own whims and fancies, his own attachment and bhranti (delusion). But very quickly he is made to realise his folly. In the second chapter he says: “sishyas-te’ham sadhi mam tvam prapannam—I am Your disciple. I have taken refuge in Thee. Please teach me. Please guide me. Please enlighten me. Please lead me; otherwise I am lost.” Thus he appeals to the guru.
Now, there itself is the first transformation. Arjuna gives up his own self-assertive state of saying “I am right,” and he is able to recognise his delusion. He does not rebel when it is pointed out by the Master: “What has happened to you? What is this type of moha (delusion), this kasmalam (dejection) in which you are caught? Are you not ashamed? Stand up! Stop this!” When he was chastised, immediately it worked. He realised: “I am doing something very foolish, something wrong.” And so he says: “I am sorry. I was not myself. I take shelter at Your feet. Please instruct me.”
Thus, from then onwards, there is established this connection where he is eager to receive, wants to be guided, wants to be taught and is willing to listen. And his earnestness and sincerity are brought out by the questions he asks: “Please, this is not clear to me. You say this, You say that. I am confused. Kindly, out of mercy, compassion, make this clearer to me.” He wants every doubt cleared. He is a jijnasu (seeker of Truth). Right from the start he keeps on asking, and Krishna keeps on giving.
So you must see that the Gita teachings commence when the guru sishya relationship has been voluntarily undertaken and fully expressed: “I am Your disciple. I take shelter at Your feet. Remove this delusion. Tell me what is good for me.” And at the culmination, when their samparka (contact) becomes fruitful in absolute discipleship, we have the grand last verse. What is the fruit of such discipleship, this type of yoga, guru sishya yoga, this inner connection between the seeking soul and the illumining, liberating master? The glory of it is brought out in the last verse of the Gita. If there is such obedience, if there is such oneness, samparka, then all auspiciousness and blessedness, all plenty, prosperity and victory become assured.
Therefore, by the grace of the Lord and the blessings of Gurudev, we have been able to ponder this important aspect of the guru sishya relationship. We see that the greater the samyoga (contact), the greater is the illumination and benefit to the disciple and the greater is the ability of the guru to go on sharing, giving and transfering—“Yes, whatever I have is yours. Come, take it.” This is possible only if this samparka (contact) is there.
The great samparka is bhakti, parabhakti. A further samparka is constant living in the spirit of the guru’s teachings, the constant carrying out of his instructions, fulfilling all his ajnas, making oneself the embodiment of guru upadesa and guru adesa. This becomes the deepest connection, heart connection, innermost connection between the sishya and the guru. The sishya becomes the embodiment of the guru’s teachings. He strives earnestly and diligently to make himself the very personification of guru upadesa and guru adesa. This is the greatest blessedness. This is the essence of discipleship. What is sishyatva (disciplehood)? It is making oneself the very pratikam (image) of the guru ajna, guru upadesa and guru adesa.
6. THE ESSENCE OF THE GURU-DISCIPLE RELATIONSHIP
The blessed holy land of India has given us the goal of God-realisation as being the supreme, ultimate, most important and highest goal of human existence. Its ancient wisdom and living spiritual experience went beyond heaven and hell, sin and merit; it went beyond all relativity and soared into the dizzy heights beyond the reach of mind and speech. It entered into a direct, absolute experience of the Great Reality that is supremely non-dual, that is one without a second, beyond all duality, beyond the three gunas, gunatita, beyond the pairs of opposites, nirdvandva.
This holy land discovered and gave to us carefully formulated and tested scientific paths to attain this innermost spiritual experience that lies at the heart of all religions, and it has thus put the entire world under a debt of gratitude.
This ashram is situated in a land where the unseen is the real, where man is divine, where life is a process of attaining the realisation of God, and where every action is regarded as part and parcel of this adoration, this worship and this attempt to reach God; the whole of life is pervaded by the spirit of yoga. It is a land where sages, saints, mystics and holy people in each generation have lived the spiritual life of renunciation, austerity, penance, prayer, devotion, worship and deep meditation, and having attained illumination have left behind for us the proof positive that this Reality exists, that this path is valid. If practised in such a way, the same experience can be attained by you, me and everyone.
Thus, spiritual life is a possibility. It is a reality; it is not a fantasy. Through their lives, generation after generation, this great discovery of ancient times was proved to be true again and again. It was tested and not found wanting; it was tested and found true, authentic, genuine, practicable— yielding results.
The uniqueness of your lives is that you have received this as your heritage, and having received it you have embraced this great ideal, and you have made it your life. You have made your life a spiritual process, a spiritual ascent towards Reality, towards liberation, towards divine perfection. Thus, through your lives, their lives have proved fruitful. “Lives of great men oft remind us that we can make our life sublime.” What is the use if no one followed, did not want to become sublime? These great ones would have lived in vain.
But, it is not so. To this day, everywhere in the world their teachings are still benefiting and guiding seeking souls. Therefore, through our lives we vindicate their renunciation and penance, their silence and seclusion, their self-denial and deep spiritual meditations. We vindicate their worth. Thus we are meant to understand life. We are to live to fulfil a great ancient ideal.
But then, the essence of such living is a deep inner conviction of the reality of that great Goal. And the essence of such living would also be an intense desire that we should attain that Goal and also the willingness to pay the price. For the sake of the Goal, a disciple must be willing to give up everything petty, and, most important of all, be willing to give oneself up, to renounce one’s little self, to renounce the very reality of one’s temporary, earthly being. “Whoever clings to his life shall lose it, and whoever loses his life shall save it.” “Kill this little ‘I’. Die to live. Lead the divine life.”
All great souls have discovered this same truth and have proclaimed it in slightly varying words. “For it is in dying to the little self that one attains to everlasting life.” “When shall I be free, O Master?” The Master replies: “When ‘I’ shall cease to be.” The disciple, now knowing, then says: “Then shall I be free, when ‘I’ shall cease to be.”
Therefore, our ancients have said: “This can be attained through discipleship— tadviddhi pranipatena pariprasnena sevaya. Go to a guru, sit at his feet and ask for his knowledge.” The guru says: “Yes, I am here to remove the ignorance that is your bondage and give you knowledge. I am the surgeon who will remove the cataract and restore your vision.” But then, if the patient says: “No, no, no, I want my vision restored, but I do not want my cataract removed; it is mine, I like it, it is part of me; cure my blindness without removing the cataract,” then the surgeon will say: “Sorry sir, that is not possible. The cataract is something that you do not require. It is your enemy not your friend, your liability not an asset. You have to get rid of it. I am helping to remove the obstruction to your vision so you can once again see, to bring light in place of darkness, to remove that which is causing the darkness.”
Thus, the essence of the guru is to remove the ignorance that is the cause of bondage, sorrow and suffering. And the essence of the disciple is a keen eagerness, a great desire, to be free from ignorance, to get rid of this layer of ignorance and attain illumination. Unless there is this willingness, this deep eagerness to attain illumination, then the disciple is no disciple. A hundred gurus cannot help unless the disciple has a great desire for liberation and is seeking to get rid of that which stands in the way.
Ultimately, the innermost quintessence of real tyaga is renunciation of oneself, the renunciation of one’s very identity, because that is the quintessence of ignorance. Maya abides in the jivatma as ahamkara (ego). The svarupa of avidya is ahamkara. The essential nature of ignorance is ego, considering oneself to be the body. Therefore, the essence of discipleship is the willingness to die to one’s human personality and identify oneself with one’s nija svarupa, one’s own true nature, to give up what constitutes the ignorance within one. If one clings to it, the guru may be a sad-guru or he may be sakshat bhagavan