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The following excerpts from the book are included with
the permission of Abhishiktananda Society.
In the book, Swami has adopted a pseudonym "Vanya"
(forest dweller).
1) The two questions of Swami Abhishiktananda : about
a) The Ultimate Reality and (b) Initiation (Diksha)
2) On meeting a true Guru : Inspired reflections of
Swami Abhishiktananda on his darsan of Sadguru Gnanananda and on the
mystery of the Guru.
3) On Sri Gnanananda's age: Thoughts on Gnani's non-identification
with his physical body and his transcendance of time and space.
4) On Siva Linga: Swami Abhishiktananda spends a night
alone in the temple in Agaram village near Thapovanam. His reflections
on Siva Linga are profound.
5) On Meditation (Dhyana) - The One Essential : Sadguru
Gnanananda's clarifications to Swami Abishiktananda on various aspects
of spiritual sadhana, dhyana, pranayama, etc.
6) On Guru: Swami Abishiktananda describes Sadguru
Gnanananda as an embodiment of love. The master expounds Guru Tattwa
- the principle of the Guru. Guru Darsan is at the time of Self-realisation,
and the Guru-murti, the visible Guru shows the way. After pointing out
four types of bhaktas, Sri Gnanananda describes the characteristics
of a Gnani who is the best amongst the bhaktas (devotees).
7) "Drop the bundle, I shall take you over": The concluding
pages of the book contain the conversations of Swami Abhishiktananda
with Sadguru Gnanananda. After describing how to stay in the awareness
of Atman, the Guru emphasises the importance of detachment and renunciation
1)The two questions of Swami Abhishiktananda :
a) The Ultimate Reality
Vanya soon joined in the conversation, first through the medium
of English and then directly in Tamil. His Tamil was no doubt very elementary
and his pronunciation lamentable. Yet, soon there developed an inward
understanding between him and the Master, which went beyond the words
being uttered or heard.
After a little while he asked, 'What is Swami-ji's
position concerning supreme reality? Is it dvaita or advaita? When all
is said and done, does any difference remain between God and creatures?
Is there at least some possibility for man to enjoy God and to realize
this enjoyment in eternity? - or is there in the last resort nothing
but Being itself, non-dual (advaita) and indivisible, in its infinite
fullness? 'What is the use of such questions?' replied Sri Gnanananda
at once. 'The answer is within you. Seek it in the depths of your being.
Devote yourself to dhyana, meditation, beyond all forms, and the solution
will be given you directly.'
(b) Initiation (Diksha)
The visitor went on to ask, 'Does Swami-ji perform rites of initiation?'
To Vanya's mind this was something of a test question. The eagerness
of Hindus-and not only Hindus-for such practices, is well known. In
the course of more or less elaborate ceremonies the disciple places
himself under the Guru's protection. The latter then secretly imparts
to him some mantra which he will have to repeat faithfully, and sometimes
adds some ritual that has to be performed. It is thought that the disciple
is bound to make marvelous progress as a result of the almost 'magical'
power of this 'sacrament', and to derive superlative benefits, both
spiritual and material, from the recitation of the mantra and the performance
of the ritual. And indeed the disciple's faith, if not the guru's grace,
often does cause the initiation (diksha) that he has received to be
effective. But very often also the Swamis for motives that vary greatly,
as some only want to help their disciples, while others hope to extort
a generous offering (gurudakshina) -show an anxiety to impart mantras
which is only equalled by that of the devotees in asking for them. Even
Sri Ramana's great disciple, Ganapati Sastri, regretted that his master
would not agree to give mantras at least to beginners, and actually
offered to do so in his place. For this reason Vanya awaited Gnanananda's
reply with special interest.'Initiations-what is the use of them?'
was again the reply. 'Either the disciple is not ready, in which case
the so-called initiation is no more than empty words; or else the disciple
is ready, and then neither words nor signs are needed. The initiation
takes place by itself.' He went on: 'So long as you perceive the world,
it is ignorance, not-knowing, a-jnana. When nothing of the world is
any more perceived, it is wisdom, jnana, the only true knowledge.'
2) The Meeting
One hour, or may be two, had passed since Vanya had sat down before
the Swami, but he had scarcely noticed the time. He had not even felt
the strain of sitting cross-legged, which normally troubled him greatly
when he had to remain in this position for a long time without moving.
When he stood up again, everything seemed to have changed. He had come
here out of curiosity, but found that the few words which this old man
had said to him had gone home directly to his heart. There they seemed
to have opened abysses of which till then he had no idea, to have released
in his heart a spring of living water of incomparable sweetness. And
yet all that had been said to him here was already familiar to him;
he had read it, heard it, and pondered it at length. He had learned
nothing new at the level of words or ideas. But it was just that it
had been repeated in such a way that a communication beyond words was
established between the master and himself at the deepest level in each
of them. All that the guru was saying to him seemed to Vanya to be welling
up directly from the inmost recesses of his own heart.
In the course of his travels through India, Vanya
had met with those pedlers of wisdom whose disciples, Indian and European
alike, vied with each other in boosting their guru's reputation. Here
and there he had also come across some truly spiritual people, or at
least some who were searching in complete sincerity for wisdom and realization.
But now it seemed clear to him that he was in direct contact with the
definitive experience of realization. And no one can have such a contact
without paying the price. It is like a burn which marks you for life,
whose scar can never be healed. It is a fire which never ceases to bum
so long as there is anything left to be consumed, so long as this whole
world, in its 'separateness' is not reduced to ashes. As for this man
whom he had approached almost as a tourist, Vanya felt that he had virtually
taken possession of his very being. He realized that the allegiance
which he had never in his life freely yielded to anyone, was now given
without a second thought to Gnanananda. He had often heard tell of gurus,
of the unreasoning devotion of their disciples, of the way in which
they surrender themselves totally to their guru-which to him, as a European
with a mind shaped by Greek culture, seemed utterly senseless. Yet,
now, all of a sudden, that had become for him simple truth, plain fact,
an experience that took him right out of himself. This man with short
legs and unkempt beard, scantily clad in a loincloth, who had so suddenly
burst into his life, could now ask him to do no matter what, even to
set out like Sadashiva to wander on the roads, for ever naked and silent
- and he, Vanya, would not even think of asking him for the slightest
explanation. And then, without even considering the matter, Vanya and
Harold found themselves side by side on the floor, pressing the master's
feet with fervent hands. Vanya had had the darshana of the great Ramana
during the year preceding his disappearance from this world. But in
those days the Maharshi was only visible from the midst of the crowd
and for the few moments allowed by the ashram authorities. Then too
Sri Ramana was seated on the magnificent granite couch, like a throne,
which had been carved to the order of his Bengali disciple Bose, in
the main mandapa of the temple of the Mother…
Vanya had indeed gazed into those eyes which, like
Gnanananda's were so full of love and deep peace. He had sensed something
of that call to the Within, which seemed to sound from the very depth
of that man's awareness, now merged in the primordial mystery. It was
surely that call which so often brought him back to the foot of the
blessed mountain, to live in those same caves in which Sri Ramana had,
as it were, been swallowed up by Arunachala, the implacable. However,
no words had been exchanged between the Sage and the man from beyond
the seas. The Maharshi remained too distant for him to reach. He was
separated from the crowd and from the enthusiasm of the devotees by
the sanctuary with its oil lamps and dishes of incense, not to mention
the privileged disciples who took turns to serve him and remained constantly
at his side. At that time Vanya was still too fresh from Europe. He
did not know the language, and above all he had not yet sufficiently
penetrated the inner world to be capable of directly understanding the
mysterious language of silence.
Beyond the experience of things and places,
of watching or participating in worship, of reading, or meditating on
the Scriptures, of listening to lectures, there is the experience of
meeting those in whose hearts, the Invisible has been disclosed, and
through whom the glory shines in all its brightness which is the mystery
of the guru. The honourable title of 'guru' is unfortunately too often
debased by being used inappropriately, if not sacrilegiously. No one
should utter this word, let alone call someone his guru, if he himself
does not yet have the heart and soul of a disciple. It is in fact as
unusual to meet a real disciple as it is to meet a real guru. Hindu
tradition is right in saying that when the disciple is ready, the guru
automatically appears, and only those who are not yet worthy of it spend
their time, in running after gurus. Guru and disciple form a dyad, a
pair, whose two components call for each other and belong together.
No more than the two poles (of a magnet) can they exist without being
related to each other. On the way towards unity they are a dyad. In
the ultimate realisation they are a non-dual reciprocity.
The guru is certainly not any kind of teacher, not
a professor, nor a preacher, nor an ordinary spiritual guide or director
of souls, one who has learnt from books or perhaps from someone else
that which he in turn passes on to others. The guru is one who in the
first place has himself attained to the Real, and who knows by personal
experience the path that leads there; one who is capable of giving the
disciple the essential introduction to this path, and causing the immediate
and ineffable experience, which he himself has, to spring up directly
from and in the disciple's heart - the lucid and transparent awareness
that he is. We may say that the mystery of the guru is actually the
mystery of the spirit's own depth. To come face to face with the guru
is to come face to face with the 'self' at that level of oneself that
is at once real and most hidden. The meeting with the guru is the essential
meeting, the decisive turning point in a person's life. But it is a
meeting that can only happen when once you have passed beyond the spheres
of sense and intellect. Its place lies Beyond, in the 'fine point of
the soul', as the mystics say. In human encounters duality is still
left intact. At their best we may say that a fusion takes place and
that the two become one in love and desire; but in the meeting of guru
and disciple there is not even a fusion, for we are in the sphere of
the original non-duality. Advaita remains for ever incomprehensible
to anyone who has not first lived it existentially in his meeting with
the guru. That which the guru says springs up from the very heart of
the disciple. It is not someone else who is speaking to him. He is not
receiving in his mind thoughts which have come from elsewhere and have
been transmitted by sensible means. When the vibrations of the master's
voice reach the disciple's ear and the master's eyes look deep into
his own, then it is from within his own self, from the cave of his own
heart, now at last discovered, that the thoughts proceed which reveal
him to himself. It therefore matters little what words the guru uses.
Their whole power lies in the inward echoes which they cause. In seeing
or hearing the guru, the disciple attains to the revelation of his own
self, taking place at that deep level of himself for which everyone
is essentially seeking, even if unconsciously.
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