TAIPEI
(Taiwan)
23rd July 1994
All worldly achievements in
which man does not associate God have been described as meaningless. The spiritual masters
say:
NAM BINA JO PAHRE KHAYE,
JYON KUMAR JUTHAN MUNH PAYE;
NAM BINA JETA VYAVHAR,
JYON MIRTAK MITHYA SEEGAR.
Unless we remember the Supreme Giver, all that we eat or wear becomes meaningless. Take for instance a street dog. It moves from place to place, from door to door and eats whatever is left or thrown. Is a life? Wiseman say that human life becomes as futile as decorating a dead body.
All that we see in nature has been created by God and placed at the disposal of man. There is air, there are mountains. Then, there are so many objects which man may not even be able to reach. Therefore, man has always been advised by saints and prophets to rely on the Creator of the universe. This is the way to become noble. This is the factor that distinguishes man from other creatures.
We come across examples of people attaining salvation in different ages. It shows that this is the privilege of man alone. Here also we hear that if we have faith in God, we shall be able to realize it. This has its own advantage. We can make our life noble and purposeful. Men of wisdom also point out that we must realize the Truth without any loss of time. They try to wake us up and tell that we should not mind even if the time at our disposal is not much. We should not sit back on the pretext that most of out time or age has already gone. We should seek God-knowledge even in old age. Spiritual masters mentioned about death again and again simply to warn that man should try to come out of ignorance and the divine light as early as possible. It is said:
RAM GAYO RAVAN GAYO,
JAKA BAHU PARWAR;
KAHO NANAK THIR KICHH NAHIN,
SAPNE JYONE SANSAR.
Lord Rama had to go, Ravana had to go, because they has human body. We must, therefore, realize God while this body is there.
Take the example of a film-roll. It gets up a picture only when put into the camera. In other words the roll functions only so long as it is there in the camera. Similarly, human being can realize God only while the body is there.
Man is unable to control his mind and concentrate on God. It runs after worldly wealth and gets engrossed in whatever it comes across. The mind has been compared with as bird that starts eating the fruits of any tree it saints on. In order to control the mind and link it with God, the company of saints has its own importance, saints always help our mind to concentrate on the Almighty. This imparts noble qualities to the human mind. It becomes a real blessing for the entire earth. The earth becomes heaven. ‘Ram Rajya’ is not known by a particular design of clothing of the people. It rests only in noble qualities like kindness and non-discrimination between man and man on account of caste, etc. We must meet saints. It is essential for the mind to be noble and sublime for Ram Rajya to set in.
TAIPEI
24th July, 19994
If a thing sounds soothing for the ear, one can imagine how delightful if can prove to the heart. The divine masters have always talked about giving God a place in the heart and attain virtues. They have always sounded man against hatreds and stressed the need to acquire noble qualities of love and kindness.
Unfortunately, man does not give place to the words of the saints in his heart. The result is that he continues to create walls to divide man against man. The divine masters had to demolish these walls. They crusaded against casteism and other social diseases. Since they were aligned to Truth, they did not speak against anyone. That is why, we respect them, and we worship them.
If a person says that he must be shown the same respect as was extended to his parents, this is not possible. Today there is no dearth of such people. It is, however, nothing but a sign of ignorance, the pride of caste etc. does not pay; it does not make one noble and respectful automatically. Such people have been described as uncivilized only.
Saints point out that such feelings are not helpful even for the man himself. They prick him like thorns and make his life a hell. Then, why does he allow such feelings to enter his heart? Why can’t he discard ego that gives rise to hatred and violence? There are many examples in India and elsewhere where people are fighting in the name of religion. In fact, they do not know even the real meaning of the word ‘religion’. Saints have always tried to make him understand that there is no difference between Ram and Rahim, they being only too different names of the same Almighty. They realized the Truth themselves and asserted that it was futile to quarrel over religion. They pointed out that all human beings live on the same earth and enjoy warmth of the same sun. People having different religious faith do not have different planets to inhabit. We have many places like Hong Kong where people of different ethnic origins, having different religious faith and culture etc. stay together. Does each section of the population have a different earth, a different sun, different air, and different water of their own?
Saints here repeat the same message. They advise us to break their walls dividing humanity, whatever the pretext. We must, however, give place to the noble feelings in our hearts. Let us keep on reminding ourselves:
EK KO JANO, EK KO MANO AUR EK HO JAO
SAB MEIN SACHA EKO SOI
NA KO BAIRI, NAHI BEGANA,
SAGAL SANGA HUM KO BAN AYEE.
Know one, believe One and be One. God dwells in every human being. Nobody should be taken as a stranger. We should accept everyone as our own. But it would not be sufficient to utter these words of wisdom. We must adopt them and act upon them.
While talking of unity, the divine masters do not mean uniformity. No doubt they refer to ‘All’, but ‘All’ does not mean to them that everybody in the world should be wearing a turban or sporting a cap. They pointed out that even the various parts of our own body are not uniform. Even the fingers of the same hand are not of equal size. What they talk about is the uniformity of hearts, the unity based one virtues. We should wish well for one and all. We should remove hatred and usher in love and understanding. This is how we can prove to be useful to the society, become a source of happiness for the humanity. We should discard ego and bring in humility, the fountainhead of real happiness for ourselves as well as others.