I.108. MAIN KA SE BU JHAVN

TO WHOM SHALL I GO TO LEARN ABOUT MY BELOVED?

KABIR SAYS: "AS YOU NEVER MAY FIND THE FOREST

IF YOU IGNORE THE TREE,

SO HE MAY NEVER BE FOUND IN ABSTRACTIONS."

I.92. AVADHU BEGAM DES HAMARA

O SADHU: MY LAND IS A SORROWLESS LAND.

I CRY ALOUD TO ALL, TO THE KING AND THE BEGGAR,

THE EMPEROR AND THE FAKIR --

WHOSOEVER SEEKS FOR SHELTER IN THE HIGHEST,

LET ALL COME AND SETTLE IN MY LAND:

LET THE WEARY COME AND LAY HIS BURDENS HERE:

SO LIVE HERE, MY BROTHER,

THAT YOU MAY CROSS WITH EASE TO THAT OTHER SHORE.

IT IS A LAND WITHOUT EARTH OR SKY,

WITHOUT MOON OR STARS:

FOR ONLY THE RADIANCE OF TRUTH

SHINES IN MY LORD'S DURBAR.

KABIR SAYS: "O BELOVED BROTHER:

NAUGHT IS ESSENTIAL SAVE TRUTH."

Love is the only miracle there is. Love is the ladder from hell to heaven. Love learned well, you have learned all. Love missed, you missed your whole life. People who ask about God are not in fact asking about God; rather than asking, they are declaring that they have not known what love is. One who knows love has known the Beloved: love is the insight into the Beloved. One who asks about light, simply says that he is blind. One who asks about God, simply says his heart has not bloomed into love.

Never ask about God. If you cannot see him that simply shows you don't have eyes to see. If you cannot hear him that simply shows you are deaf. If you cannot touch him that simply shows you are without hands -- that you don't have any sensitivity. God is not the problem, God cannot be the problem. God is not far away, God is herenow. All that is, is in God and is God -- so how can God be the problem? God is not to be searched: where will you search him? He is everywhere -- you just have to learn how to open your eyes of love. Once love has penetrated your heart, God is there. In the thrill of love is the Beloved: in the vision of love is the vision of God.

So God is the only real inner alchemy: it transforms your material life into the divine. It is the only alchemy, I say, because it changes the baser metal into gold. Without love, life is a dull affair, grey -- with no colors, with no songs, with no celebrations. One can drag and one can hope only for death: death will come and relieve you of your dragging long affair. Love brings color: the grey suddenly becomes a rainbow, explodes into a thousand and one colors, and the drab and the dull become psychedelic. Love changes the whole climate of your inner being -- and with that change the whole existence is changed. Nothing is changed on the outside -- but once you are full of love you have a totally different existence available to you.

God and the world are not two things, it is the one existence. There is only one existence: seen without love, it looks material; seen without love, God looks like the world -- SANSARA. Seen with love, the world is transformed, transfigured... and the very world becomes divine.

Yes, then in sight there is music. When love has dawned, then miracles happen -- even in sight there is music; in sound, a luminous silence. Love is magical. And Kabir's whole teaching is that of love: he calls love "the divine melody." The heart, pulsating in love, becomes a flute on the lips of God... and a song is born. That song is religion.

Religion has nothing to do with churches and temples and rituals: religion is born only when somebody pulsates with love. Each individual has to give birth to a religion -- and unless you have given birth to a religion in you, you are not religious. You cannot join an organization and become religious, remember -- religion is not an organization to belong to. To be religious you have to give birth to religion in your innermost core, in your very core: when religion is born THERE, only then are you religious. Not by becoming a Christian but by becoming a Christ, not by becoming a Buddhist but by becoming a Buddha, religion is born.

When you are born in love, religion is born in you -- and then your whole life is a melody, a beautiful song. And then you will be surprised that nothing is wrong: all fits together. Right now, nothing fits together. Right now, you are a mess: right now, you are an anarchy. Right now, you are just traffic noise -- rushing in all directions, falling apart, disintegrating. Right now, you are nothing but anguish, agony. Once love is born, you have a center. Once love is born, you are centered -- and everything falls in tune with the center. You become an orchestra, a beautiful harmony. It is hidden in you: you have brought it into the world, it is yet unmanifest. Kabir says: Manifest it -- let your love be manifested. In that manifestation will be your prayer.

A few things, very basic and fundamental to understand, before we enter these beautiful sutras -- the last of the series.

The Talmud has a tremendously beautiful story to tell. A heathen came to Hillel -- a great Jewish mystic -- and cynically asked him: "Teach me the whole Torah while I stand on one foot." Now this is impossible; the Torah is a big scripture -- it really takes years to understand it. And this cynic, this skeptical person, says to Hillel: "If you have understood the Torah then give me the gist, the summary, the essential. While I stand on one foot, you tell me all that is in the Torah."

And this skeptic had been to other mystics also -- but they must not have been mystics; they were great theologians, philosophers, thinkers, pundits, scholars. They all had refused. They said, "This is impossible; the Torah needs years of study, a lifelong study. And the Torah cannot be condensed into a few sentences -- that will be sacrilege. It is not possible." But Hillel agreed, and answered immediately: "Do not unto others as you would not have others do unto you. This is the whole Torah -- the rest is commentary."

Love is the whole Torah, the rest is commentary. And what is love? -- do not do unto others that which you would not like to be done to you. This is the criterion of love: do unto others that which you would like to be done to you. Whatsoever you ask for yourself, allow that to others too. Whatsoever you don't want to happen to you, don't do it to others. Think of yourself as the very center of existence. In fact, don't think of the other as the other: only you are. and in the other too, is the same life, the same song waiting to be uttered, the same urge to rise to the divine, the same seeking, the same inquiry, the same throbbing heart, the same agony, the same ecstasy.

This love is waiting in you. There is no necessity; it can wait and you can die. Birth is beyond you. You are already born -- nobody had asked, your permission was not taken at all, you were not even asked where you wanted to be born and what you wanted to become. You always find yourself in the middle of life; you are already here. Birth is no choice for you... nor is death. One day suddenly death will come, without even giving you any warning. And not for a single moment will death wait. Birth happens, death happens -- they are beyond you; you cannot do anything about them. Between birth and death there is only one thing you can do something about, and that is love.

These are the three great things of life: life, love, death. Life has already happened. Death is going to happen -- it is a certainty. In a way, it has already happened with birth: you have already taken one step into the grave. The day you are born, half the journey is complete; the remaining half will take a little time... or a little more. With life, death has also penetrated you: now only one thing remains to be done that YOU can do, something that depends on you, and that is love. And because it depends on you, there is every possibility that you may miss it.

That is the agony of love: you can miss it. If you don't do something, if you don't become alert, if you don't move towards it consciously, deliberately, you may miss it. There is every possibility that you may not be able to unfold it -- hence the fear, the trembling, the anguish, the anxiety: will I be able to make it? will I be able to move into love? will I be able to flow into love? But side by side with this agony there is an ecstasy -- that one is free.

It is because of freedom that the fear exists. If love was also predestined, as life and death are, then there would have been no fear, but then there would have been no ecstasy either -- because ecstasy is possible only when you achieve something, when consciously you choose something, when deliberately you arrive somewhere, when it is YOUR journey and you are not being dragged. That's the beauty of love and that's the danger too.

Meditate on these lines from Rilke...

I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES

THAT FALL INTO A REAL ACCORDANCE SCARCE AT ALL

FOR DEATH'S NOTE TENDS TO DOMINATE.

BOTH THOUGH ARE RECONCILED

IN THE DARK INTERVAL TREMBLINGLY

AND THE SONG REMAINS IMMACULATE.

Lines of tremendous significance. I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES... death and birth. These are the two notes played on you by the unknown. And I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN THE TWO NOTES -- you are the pause, the interval, the gap, between birth and death. Very subtle.

I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES

THAT FALL INTO A REAL ACCORDANCE SCARCE AT ALL...

It is very rare. Only in a Buddha or in a Christ, death and life fall into real accord... and the melody is born -- in a Kabir, in a Mahavira. SCARCE AT ALL -- very rare is the phenomenon when life and death come to an inner harmony: the conflict ceases, the rift is bridged, and both become part of one melody -- not in conflict but in cooperation.

I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES

THAT FALL INTO A REAL ACCORDANCE SCARCE AT ALL

FOR DEATH'S NOTE TENDS TO DOMINATE...

Life has happened, birth has happened, now death is going to happen. So our life is predominated too much by death -- hence everybody is in search of security, safety, insurance: how to avoid death? How to prolong life a little longer? How to be here a little more? How not to die? How to escape from death? Death predominates -- hence money becomes so important.

Remember, the importance of money is the importance of death, because money gives you a false sense of security -- that you have money, that you have the physicians, that you have the medicine, that you have the bank balance, that you have the life insurance, that you have friends, that you have a good house, that if there is some trouble you are protected. So a person becomes obsessed too much with money: have more and more money, create big China Walls of money around you, so death cannot penetrate.

But nothing can prevent death. Your effort to prevent it simply destroys the opportunity which could have been a great experience, which could have flowered into love. There are only two types of people in the world: death-oriented and love-oriented. Life has already happened, so there is no question about it. Nobody is worried about birth -- that has already happened.

In India we have three gods -- TRIMURTI, the Indian trinity -- three faces of one god: Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva. Brahma is the god who created the world, Vishnu is the god who maintains the world, and Shiva is the god who will destroy the world. Now, you will be surprised. There is not a single temple dedicated to Brahma, the god who created the world. Who bothers? -- once you have already created your work is finished. You will not find a single temple dedicated to Brahma. Yes, there is only one temple -- very rare, somewhere in India -- but it is impossible to find. Thousands and thousands of temples are there -- in one town you can find hundreds of temples, but not a single temple dedicated to Brahma, who has CREATED the world. What type of gratitude is this? But who bothers about life? -- it has already happened. Birth is not the question.

You will find Shiva worshipped everywhere; the most worshipped god is Shiva. Millions of temples are dedicated to Shiva: he is the god of death. Number two is Vishnu, who maintains life. People worship Vishnu; but even people who worship Vishnu, when they are in danger they immediately run to Shiva's temple -- because he is the ultimate god. Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva: three are the gods. Shiva is called "the great god" -- MAHADEVA; the other two are lesser gods. Death predominates.

I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN THE TWO NOTES

THAT FALL INTO A REAL ACCORDANCE SCARCE AT ALL

FOR DEATH'S NOTE TENDS TO DOMINATE.

BOTH THOUGH ARE RECONCILED

IN THE DARK INTERVAL TREMBLINGLY...

And that dark interval is love -- where death and life meet, where death and life embrace each other, where life and death have a love affair, where life and death come ton orgasm. Hence, there is tremendous attraction in love, because it is life... and fear also, because it is death too. When you make love to a woman or a man, you never go totally into it. You go so far, because it is life -- then you start hesitating, then you don't go any further, because then death is also there. It is the pause between the two notes, and it is dark -- the dark interval between the two.

Why does Rilke call it dark? Love IS dark. It is not just a coincidence that people have chosen the night to make love -- it is not just coincidence: there is some affinity between darkness and love. Making love in the bright light looks a little rude, vulgar, ugly. Making love in the marketplace where others can watch is just insane. One needs privacy -- and darkness gives you absolute privacy, because in the darkness you cannot see the beloved, the beloved cannot see you. You are absolutely alone; the other is not any interference.

Love has a quality of darkness in it, because it has depth. Darkness is always deep, light is shallow. Remember, howsoever much light is there, light is always shallow. Look: the day is shallow -- night is so deep, infinite. Love is like the dark... deep rest... falling into tremendous depth. Death is also dark: all over the world, death has been painted as dark. Love is dark, death is also dark -- there is an affinity between love and death too.

Many people come to me and they say, "Why are we so much afraid of love? Why? We hanker for it, and yet we are afraid, and when the opportunity arises we are stuck; we cannot let go." Because love is half death and half life -- that is the dilemma. It is THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES...

BOTH THOUGH ARE RECONCILED

IN THE DARK INTERVAL TREMBLINGLY...

You live in love, and you die too. Or -- you die, that's why you live. A crucifixion and a resurrection...

AND THE SONG REMAINS IMMACULATE.

Unless you have known what love is, you have not known what melody is. It is the meeting, orgasmic meeting, of death and life. Unless love is known, you have missed. You were born, you lived, and you died -- but you missed. You missed tremendously, you missed utterly, you missed absolutely -- you missed the interval in between. That interval is the highest pinnacle, the peak experience. Kabir calls it the divine melody.

To attain it, there are four steps to be remembered. The first step: be herenow -- because love is possible only in the herenow. You cannot love in the past. Many people do that, but you cannot really love in the past. Many people simply live in the memory -- they loved in the past. And there are others who love in the future -- that too cannot be done. These are ways to avoid love: the past and the future are the ways to avoid love. So either you love in the past, or you love in the future -- and love is possible only in the present, because only n this moment death and life are meeting... in the dark interval that is within you. That dark interval is always present, always present, always present. It is never past and it is never future.

If you think too much -- and thinking is always of the past or of the future -- your energies will be distracted from feeling. Feeling is herenow. If your energies are moving into the pattern of thinking then you will not have enough energies to move into feelings -- and love will not be possible.

So the first step is: be herenow. Future and past bring thinking; thinking destroys feeling. And a person too much obsessed with thinking, by and by completely forgets that he has a heart too. A man who is too much into thinking, by and by starts moving in such a way, starts living in such a way, where feeling has no say. Not listening to the feeling, by and by feeling starts falling away from him. There are millions of people in this state, who don't know what heart means. They think heart is just a pump. Their whole concentration is in the head. Head is an extremity; it is needed, it is a good instrument, but it has to be used as a slave. It should not be the master. Once the head becomes the master and the heart os left behind, you will live, you will die, but you will not know what God is because you will not know what love is.

The same dark interval, first contacted looks like love... and when you are lost into it totally, it becomes God. Love is the beginning of God -- or God, the ultimate peak of love.

The second step towards love, and towards the divine melody, is: learn to transform your poisons into honey. Because many people love, but then their love is very much contaminated by poisons -- with hate, with jealousy, with anger, with possessiveness... a thousand and one poisons surround your love. Love is a delicate thing. Just think of anger, hatred, possession, jealousy: how can love survive?

First, people move into the head and forget the heart -- they are in the majority. Then a minority still lives a little in the heart, but then that minority does another wrong: the small light of love is surrounded by jealousy, hatred, anger, a thousand and one poisons. Then the whole journey becomes bitter. I told you, love is the ladder between heaven and hell, but the ladder is always a two-way thing: you can go up, you can come down. If there are poisons, the ladder will bring you down -- you will be entering into hell and not into heaven. And instead of attaining to a melody, your life will become a nauseous noise -- conflicting, traffic noise; just a maddening noise -- a crowd of many noises with no harmony. You will remain on the verge of madness.

So the second thing to remember is: learn to transform your poisons into honey. How are they transformed? There is a very simple process. In fact, to call it transformation is not right, because you don't do anything; you only need patience. This is one of the greatest secrets I am telling you. Try it: when anger comes you are not to do anything; just sit silently and watch it. Don't be against it, don't be for it. Don't cooperate with it, don't repress it. Just watch it, be patient, just see what happens... let it rise.

Remember one thing: don't do anything in the moment of anger -- wait. Just give it a little time and wait... and you will be surprised. And one day you will understand that if you can wait enough, anger itself becomes compassion. It is a wheel; it is moving on its own -- YOU are in a hurry. Just as night becomes day if you can wait a little, in the same way, anger becomes compassion if you can wait a little. The same energy -- just patience has to be added to it, nothing else. You try it.

Remember one thing: never do anything in the mood when the poison is possessing you; just wait. When the poison has started changing into its other.... This is one of the basic laws of life: that everything continuously changes into its other. Just as I told you that man changes into woman, woman changes into man, there are periodical changes in you -- the good man becomes the bad, the bad man becomes the good; the saint has sinner's moments and the sinner has saintly moments... one has just to wait.

Act when the saint is uppermost -- that's all. Don't act when the sinner is uppermost, don't act when anger is uppermost, otherwise you will repent and you will create a chain of reactions and you will get into karma. That's the whole meaning of getting into karma. Do anything when you are in a negative moment and you will be in a chain, and there is no end to it. When you are negative you do something, the other becomes negative, the other is ready to do something -- negativity creates more negativity. Negativity provokes more negativity, anger brings more anger, hostility brings more hostility, and things go on and on and on... and people have been entangled with each other for LIVES together. And they continue!

Wait. When you are angry, this is the moment to meditate. Don't waste this moment anger is creating such great energy in you -- it can destroy. But energy is neutral -- the same energy that can destroy, can be creative. Wait. The same energy that can shatter, can shower life -- just wait. Waiting and not doing anything in a hurry, one day you will be surprised, seeing the inner change. You were full of anger, and then anger goes on and on and comes to a climax... and then the wheel turns. And you can see the wheel is turning, and the anger is relaxing, and energy is released, and now you are in a positive mood -- the creative mood. Now you can do something. Now do. Always wait for the positive.

And what I am saying is not repression. I am not saying to repress the negative, I am saying watch the negative. Remember the difference, tremendous difference is there. I am not saying sit on top of the negative, forget the negative, do something against it -- no. I am not saying that. I am not saying when you are angry, smile -- no; that smile is false, ugly, phoney. Don't smile when you are angry. Then close the room, keep a mirror in front of you, see your angry face yourself. There is no need to show it to anybody else. It is your business, it is your energy, it is your life, and you have to wait for the right moment. Go on looking in the mirror: see the red face, the red eyes, the murderer there.

Have you ever thought that everybody carries a murderer inside? You also carry a murderer inside. Don't think that the murderer exists somewhere else -- somebody else is a murderer who commits a murder -- no: everybody has the possibility to commit a murder. You carry the suicidal instinct in you.

Just look in the mirror: these are your climates -- you have to be acquainted with them. This is part of the growth towards self-knowledge. You have heard so much, from Socrates to today: "Know thyself" -- but this is the way to know thyself. "Know thyself" does not mean sit silently and repeat, "I am Brahma, I am Soul., I am God, I am This" -- all nonsense. "Know thyself" means know all thy climates, all possibilities -- the murderer, the sinner, the criminal, the saint, the holy man inside you, the virtue, the God, the Devil -- know all the climates, the whole range of it, and by knowing it you will be discovering secrets, keys.

You will see that anger cannot be there forever -- or can it be? You have not tried it; you try it -- it cannot be there forever. If you don't do anything, what is going to happen? Can anger hang there forever and forever? Nothing hangs there forever. Happiness comes and goes, unhappiness comes and goes. Can't you see a simple law? -- that everything changes, nothing remains permanent. So why be in a hurry? Anger has come -- it will be going. You just wait, have a little patience. Just look in the mirror and wait. Let anger be there, let your face go ugly and murderous -- but wait, watch.

Don't repress and don't act according to the anger, and soon you will see that the face is becoming softer, eyes are becoming calmer, the energy is changing -- the male turning into female... and soon you will be full of radiance. The same redness that was anger, now is a certain radiance -- a beauty on your face, in your eyes. Now go out: the time has come to act.

Act when you are positive. Don't force positivity, wait for the positivity to come on its own. This is the secret -- when I say "learn to transform your poisons into honey" this is what I mean.

And third: share. Whenever it is negative, keep it to yourself. Whenever it is positive, share. Ordinarily, people share their negativities; they don't share their positivities. Humanity is simply stupid. When they are happy they don't share, they are very miserly. When they are unhappy they are very very spendthrift -- then they are very much ready to share. When people smile they smile very economically -- just so, so far. But when they are angry they are totally angry. The third step is to share the positivity. That will bring your love flowing riverlike, arising from your heart. Your dilemma of the heart will start moving when you share.

I have heard a very strange saying of Jorge Luis Borges. Listen to it...

GIVE THAT WHICH IS HOLY UNTO THE DOGS

CAST THY PEARLS BEFORE SWINE

FOR THE THING THAT MATTERETH IS GIVING.

You have heard the contrary saying: Don't throw to the dogs, and don't cast pearls before the swine, because they will not understand. Says Borges...

GIVE THAT WHICH IS HOLY UNTO THE DOGS

CAST THY PEARLS BEFORE SWINE

FOR THE THING THAT MATTERETH IS GIVING.

The real thing is not what you are giving -- pearls and holiness and love -- and TO WHOM you are giving; that is not the point. The point is that you are giving. When you have, give it.

Gurdjieff used to say, "All that I hoarded was lost, and all that I gave is mine. All that I gave is still with me, and all that I hoarded is lost, gone." True: you have only that which you have shared. You have only as much love as you have shared. Love is not a property to be hoarded, it is a radiance, a fragrance to be shared. The more you share, the more you have; the less you share, the less you have. The more you share, the more will be arising from your innermost core -- it is infinite: more will be welling up. Draw water from a well, and more water comes running fresh into the well. Don't draw the water, close the well, become a miser, and no more springs will function. By and by, spring will become dead, blocked; and the water that is in the well will die, will become stale, dirty. The flowing water is fresh... the flowing love is fresh.

So the third step towards love is: share your positivities, share your life, share all that you have. Whatsoever beautiful is with you, never hoard it. Your wisdom, share; your prayer, share; your love, your happiness, your delight, share. Yes, if you cannot find anybody, share it with dogs -- but share. Share it with rocks -- but share. When you have pearls, throw them -- don't bother whether they are swine or saints, just throw them. THE THING THAT MATTERETH IS GIVING.

Hoarding poisons the heart. All hoarding is poisonous. If you share, your system will be free of poisons. And when you give, don't bother whether it is responded to or not. Don't even wait for a thank-you. Feel grateful to the person who allowed you to share something with him. Not otherwise -- don't wait, saying deep in your heart that he should be thankful because you shared something with him. No -- feel thankful yourself that he was ready to listen to you, to share some energy with you... that he was ready to listen to your song... that he was ready to see your dance... that when you had come to give to him he didn't reject -- he could have rejected.

Sharing is one of the most spiritual virtues, one of the greatest spiritual virtues.

And the fourth: be nothing. Once you start thinking that you are somebody, you stop; then love does not flow. Love flows only out of somebody who is a nobody. Love abides only in nothingness. When you are empty, there is love. When you are full of the ego, love disappears. Love and ego cannot exist together. Love can exist with God but cannot exist with the ego, because love and God are synonymous. Love and ego are impossible to be together. So be nothing. That is the meaning of being humble, meek. Says Jesus: Blessed are the meek, for theirs is the Kingdom of God.

These four steps -- and now the sutras will be easy to understand. First...

TO WHOM SHALL I GO TO LEARN ABOUT MY BELOVED?

"To whom shall I go to learn about my Beloved?' Kabir says: Where should I go to learn about my Beloved? Where is my Beloved? Where is his abode? and who can show it to me?

KABIR SAYS: "AS YOU NEVER MAY FIND THE FOREST

IF YOU IGNORE THE TREE,

SO HE MAY NEVER BE FOUND IN ABSTRACTIONS."

A tremendously significant sutra, of very great value -- like a criterion. Listen: I come across people who say, "We love humanity" -- and they have not loved a single human being. Humanity is an abstraction. How can you love humanity -- just tell me? Where will you find humanity/ How will you hug humanity? How will you kiss humanity/ No, these are tricks of the mind. Wherever you come across anyone, you will always come across a human being.

Humanity is nowhere; there are only human beings and human beings. Humanity is an abstraction, an idea; it just exists in the minds of philosophers -- nowhere else. But a very tricky idea: you can avoid human beings in the name of humanity -- you can even kill human beings in the name of humanity. You can say, "I am serving humanity, and you are coming in the way, so I will destroy you." That's what Adolf Hitler says, that's what Joseph Stalin says, that's what Chairman Mao says, that's what all the politicians of the world say: "We love humanity. To save humanity, we will have to kill human beings." these are very tricky ideas.

KABIR SAYS: "AS YOU NEVER MAY FIND THE FOREST

IF YOU IGNORE THE TREE...

The forest exists not -- `forest' is just a word. That which exists is the tree. Trees and trees and trees -- they exist; and if you start looking for the forest and ignoring the trees, you will never find the forest. Maybe that's why so many people look for God and never find him -- they look for an abstraction. God is like the forest: you will find a tree, a rock, a man, a woman, a dog, a snake, a star -- these things you will find; you will not find God anywhere. God is the name of the totality. He exists in these particulars; he has nowhere any other existence. He exists in the snake as the snake, and he exists in the tree as the tree, and he exists in the rock as the rock, and he exists in the man as the man.

Kabir is indicating something of great importance. People ask; Where is God? Standing in the forest, they are asking, "Where is the forest?" If you say, "You are surrounded by forest," they will say, "This is an oak tree, this is a pine tree -- but where is the forest? I know there are trees, this is a pine tree -- but where is the forest? I know there are trees, but where is the forest? I want to know the forest." But this man will go mad and he will never come across the forest. Denying the tree, there is no forest. The forest exists in the oak, in the pine, in the cedar. The forest manifests into a thousand and one forms. The forest in itself cannot be found -- that is just an abstraction, a universal.

Find the particular and forget the universal. That is the difference between real religion and false religion. False religion is dedicated to abstractions, real religion is dedicated to particulars. Love the man, love the woman, love the child, love the animal, love the tree, love the stars.... Don't ask for God, and you will find God.

Loving a woman, loving an animal, loving a tree, by and by you will become aware that the tree is not just a tree. The tree far transcends the tree itself; it is transcendental. Loving a woman, you will know that she is not just the body, not just the mind; something FAR transcendental is hidden behind. The woman becomes a window -- a window into God. Your own child becomes a window unto God.

Love the particular, the concrete, the real, and you can see what mischief people have done in the name of abstractions. Christians fighting against Mohammedans, Mohammedans fighting against Hindus, and asked, "For what?" -- they say, "God." The Mohammedan god is an abstraction, the Christian god is an abstraction, the Hindu god is an abstraction. Only godliness exists. And you kill the Hindu, and you kill the Mohammedan, and you kill the Christian: you kill real gods in the name of false ideas; you kill real persons in the name of theories.

Kabir says: This is no way -- so I am not going to ask anybody, "Where is my Beloved?" I am going to love, and find my Beloved in loving. I am not going to ask, "Where is God? What is God?" and the definition of it. No, I am going to start loving -- and through love the definition is going to come into me. The comprehension will come through love -- not through ideation, not through thinking. This is the way of the heart -- to start loving. And the way of the mind is to go on thinking.

AVADHU BEGAM DES HAMARA

And Kabir says: By loving, I have come to a point where no misery exists.

O SADHU: MY LAND IS A SORROWLESS LAND.

Love knows no sorrow. If you still know sorrow, you don't know love. Love knows no sorrow, no sadness. How can love know sorrow? It is impossible -- because love is a transcendence if life and death, both. It is going beyond life and death, both. It is the pause between two notes. It is higher than life, it is higher than death... how can there be sorrow? And it is a pause, silence... how can there be sorrow?

O SADHU: MY LAND IS A SORROWLESS LAND.

I CRY ALOUD TO ALL, TO THE KING AND THE BEGGAR,

THE EMPEROR AND THE FAKIR --

WHOSOEVER SEEKS FOR SHELTER IN THE HIGHEST,

LET ALL COME AND SETTLE IN MY LAND...

And Kabir says: Come to the land of love. Don't go on fighting about doctrines, dogmas. Don't go on hair-splitting -- don't waste time. I have arrived -- and I declare to all and sundry, to kings and to beggars, and to emperors and to fakirs, "Come to my land!"

AVADHU BEGAM DES HAMARA... and I have arrived in a country where there is no sorrow. Why are you wasting your time in abstractions and theories and philosophisations? Come! -- LET ALL COME AND SETTLE IN MY LAND...

LET THE WEARY COME AND LAY HIS BURDENS HERE...

Only love can become the rest, only love is the shelter. You can find anything, except love, but you will only be finding new tensions and nothing else; and new burdens -- and those burdens are heavy.

Jesus says: Come to me all those who are heavily burdened. My burden is light. Come to me, rest in me.

... LET ALL COME AND SETTLE IN MY LAND:

LET THE WEARY COME AND LAY HIS BURDENS HERE...

Only in love, burdens disappear. Because what in fact is the basic burden? The basic burden is that of the ego: I am -- that is the basic burden. All other burdens are accumulated on this center. This is the very hub -- I am; then you accumulate many burdens. The center has to be destroyed. Love makes you a nobody, love takes you off your ground, love destroys your ego utterly. It annihilates, it kills you completely, and it gives you a new life -- a life without any ego: a humble life, a simple life, a life which God can live through. You become a hollow bamboo... and his music starts flowing through you. You don't hinder, because you are not there to hinder him. If you are, you are the hindrance.

People come to me and they ask: How can I go beyond sorrow? I tell them: You cannot go beyond sorrow. There IS a transcendence, but YOU cannot go; you will have to drop before it. Yes, there is a state of sorrowlessness, but you cannot enter into it; you will have to drop out of it. Something within you will enter, but not you. Something within you will go into that land of no sorrow, but not you: you are the sorrow.

Have you not watched it? -- the greater your ego, the greater sorrow it creates. It hurts -- it is like a wound. The lesser the ego, the less it hurts -- the wound is healed. When there is no ego, it hurts not at all. Even if somebody insults you it does not hurt, because you are not -- how can he insult you? The insult hits you only when the wound exists -- you are defeated because you wanted to be victorious. If the ego is not, what is the difference between victory and defeat? What is the difference between success and failure?

All distinctions are created by the ego. Wherever ego feels fulfilled, it is success, victory. When ego feels unfulfilled, it is failure, defeat. All defeats and victories are because of the ego. When there is no ego, you simply live without victory, without failure. You simply live without success, without failure. You simply live... and that simple life is the religious life.

That's what Kabir mans by what he calls SADHU. SADHU means the simple, SADHU means the noncomplex, SADHU means the humble. That's what I call "sannyasin."

SO LIVE HERE, MY BROTHER,

THAT YOU MAY CROSS WITH EASE TO THAT OTHER SHORE.

"So live here, my brother, that you may cross with ease to that other shore." You can live in two ways: you can live in such a way that you become burdened so much with this shore that the journey becomes impossible to go to the other. Live lightly... so when the day comes to go to the other shore, you can simply jump on your feet and start moving.

I have heard...

When Pompei was burning, and the whole town was rushing out, and people were carrying whatsoever they could carry -- jewels, gold, silver, valuable things.... And they were all crying and weeping because they had much that they could not carry -- somebody has missed his child, somebody has missed his wife. It was a mad crowd -- the whole town on fire -- and they were all rushing out of the town just to save their lives. It was a chaos.

Only one man, it is said -- it was three o'clock in the morning -- only one man was coming out of the town very quietly, silently, as if nothing had happened. He was a mystic. He had only a walking-stick. And many people looked at him and said, "You look undisturbed." He said, "For what to get disturbed? I have nothing else -- just this walking-stick; and this is my time to go for a morning walk. So, for what?... I have nothing to lose!"

Live here in such a way that the here does not become too important for you -- don't become obsessed. It is good to live in a house, but when the time comes to leave the house one should be able to go without looking back. Be with people -- but if your wife dies, one should be able to say goodbye... silently, lovingly, with no complaint, with no grudge. Live in such a way that you don't become entangled too much.

SO LIVE HERE, MY BROTHER,

THAT YOU MAY CROSS WITH EASE TO THAT OTHER SHORE.

And that other shore is not very far away, the other shore surrounds you everywhere. If you start living rightly... and what do I mean by "rightly"? Those four steps: be herenow, learn to transform your poisons into honey, share your positivity, and be nothing. That's what I mean by "living rightly."

If you live rightly, in twenty-four hours' time you will cross many times to this shore from that, from that to this, from this to that -- many times God will penetrate you, radiate you. Many times you will be suddenly on the other shore. Walking on the street... and suddenly he is there. The sun is falling on you, the sunrays falling behind the trees... and suddenly the other shore is there. It is not somewhere far away near other galaxies; it is always here. It is a quality of your awareness, it is a quality of your understanding, it is a quality of your meditation. If you are unburdened here, unobsessed with the worldly things....

Live in the world but don't allow the world to live in you. And then you will be alone even in the crowd... and even in the crowd you will see the other shore. The other shore becomes so close that you can cross the barrier any moment you want. It is so easy, like breathing -- but the art has to be learnt. It is a question of art, skill. Be skillful. Love, but don't allow your love to become lust. Love, but don't allow your love to become attachment. Love, but don't allow your love to become a dependence, a slavery. And then... then love tremendously. Then there is no fear. And loving, you will be able to cross to the other shore without any difficulty.

Use money, but don't become money-minded. I'm not saying escape from money, and I'm not saying escape from your wife and children and desert them and go to the Himalayan caves -- I am not teaching any sort of foolishness to you. And neither is Kabir in favor of that. Kabir is tremendously life-affirmative, he's absolutely for life. In fact, anybody who knows God will be for life, because this life is of God. If you escape from life you are escaping from God himself -- from the very opportunity where he was available. Don't escape anywhere. Rather than putting effort into escaping, put more effort into becoming aware. That will be the REAL escape: without escaping anywhere, you will create a cave in your heart... and you will start living there.

And the other shore is always by the corner. Any moment you want, you can move... and you can have as many drinks out of God in the day as you like. Looking at a flower, you can drink him... and the other shore opens. It is a vision -- it is not a material thing. Looking at a roseflower, silently, lovingly, without any verbalization inside -- total silence... and the silence becomes luminous, and the silence becomes a song, and a vision arises. The flower disappears, you disappear... and God is there. In the disappearance of the subject and the object, the gap arises. Between the two notes, the pause... and suddenly you are on the other shore.

I AM THE PAUSE BETWEEN TWO NOTES

THAT FALL INTO A REAL ACCORDANCE SCARCE AT ALL

FOR DEATH'S NOTE TENDS TO DOMINATE.

BOTH THOUGH ARE RECONCILED

IN THE DARK INTERVAL TREMBLINGLY

AND THE SONG REMAINS IMMACULATE.

Look at the roseflower. You will tremble and the roseflower will tremble and there will be a pulsation between you and both will disappear... and the other shore. And suddenly you are transfigured -- transplanted into another world.

To a real SADHU, to a real sannyasin, to a real devotee, to a real seeker, disciple, this becomes very simple -- just like blinking the eyes. Close your eyes and you are on the other shore, open your eyes and you are on the other shore. The other shore is not something far away, or after death: the other shore is here between life and death. Each moment it is here -- between past and future it is here: between past and future the little gap, just a little gap, a split-second, and it is there.

The present is the presence of God...

SO LIVE HERE, MY BROTHER,

THAT YOU MAY CROSS WITH EASE TO THAT OTHER SHORE.

IT IS A LAND WITHOUT EARTH OR SKY,

WITHOUT MOON OR STARS;

FOR ONLY THE RADIANCE OF TRUTH

SHINES IN MY LORD'S DURBAR.

There is no earth, there is no sky; it is a nonmaterial dimension. There is nothing -- not even you.

IT IS A LAND WITHOUT EARTH OR SKY,

WITHOUT MOON OR STARS;

FOR ONLY THE RADIANCE OF TRUTH

SHINES IN the Kingdom of God.

"Only the radiance of truth..." Only truth IS on the other shore -- neither the seeker nor the sought, neither the observer nor the observed, neither matter nor consciousness -- only truth, only the ultimate science. And you become one with it, you are not separate from it: you become part of that divine melody.

KABIR SAYS: "O BELOVED BROTHER:

NAUGHT IS ESSENTIAL SAVE TRUTH."

Nothing else is essential. Search, seek, try to know what truth is -- and truth is not in abstractions, and truth is not in scriptures, and truth is not to be found in the dialogues of the theologians. Truth is herenow. Truth IS: you have to become available to it. Truth is in the opening of your heart -- love will become the bridge between you and truth.

Right now you are trying to live with the world, with the ego-bridge. Ego separates, love joins. Love is the only yoga -- `yoga' means union. Ego separates, makes you an island -- aloof. And look at the irony: first you cultivate the ego, and then you say, "I feel very lonely." Ego makes you feel lonely, it makes you lonely. Ego makes you like a small island. Love... again you have become the continent. Love is the bridge between you and that which is.

Kabir sings the song of love. And he says: through love you will attain to that pause between two notes... where divine melody continues... where God is playing on his veena. And that is very close by. Right now, this very moment, it is surrounding you. It is within your reach, almost within your grasp -- just a little more understanding, a little more awareness. Live in awareness. Let these four steps become your whole religion, your whole Torah -- all else is just commentary.

Be herenow... just this moment: you see the beauty of it? This very moment the benediction is here, God is here. When you are silent he speaks, when you are listening he sings.

And learn to transform your poisons into honey, so all barriers are destroyed.

Then third, start sharing: whatsoever you have, share it. Share your beauty, share your song, share your life. In sharing, you will be enriched. Don't hoard. The moment you start hoarding you are going against God. The moment you start hoarding you are trying to depend on your own self; you have lost trust in life. Give it! As life has given it to you, give it -- more will be coming.

And fourth, be nothing. Nothing is the source of all, nothing is the source of infinity... nothing is God. Nothing means NIRVANA. Be nothing -- and in being nothing, you will have attained to the whole. In being something, you will miss; in being nothing, you will arrive home.

These are the sutras of Kabir. Kabir is one of the greatest mystics of the world. Meditate on Kabir -- pay attention to him, to what he says. And he is a very simple man, not learned in any way -- all that he says is out of his experience. He is not a scholar, he does not know anything about the Veda and the Koran and the Bible. All that he says is out of his own existential experience. He is not a theoretician or a philosopher; he is a poet. And not only a poet, he is a mystic poet -- and the difference is that the poet sometimes has glimpses of God, and then he falls back again -- rare moments of flight.

In India we have a saying that if you love the poetry of any poet never go to see the poet, because then you will be disappointed. You will find a very ordinary man -- even more ordinary than ordinary people. Or you may find somebody ugly -- and he has been talking so beautifully. And you will find somebody vulgar, immoral, obscene -- and his poetry was so spiritual. The saying is right: if you love the poetry forget the poet, never go to see the poet. Because the poet only jumps -- in rare moments of insight he flies high, he's turned on, some visions descend in him... then he is closed again, turned off; then he is an ordinary man. Only sometimes, like lightning, poetry comes to him.

That is the difference between a poet and a mystic poet. A mystic poet has arrived. It is not a flight of his imagination, it is not just a vision -- now it is his very life. He breathes in God, he lives in God, he lives like God, he IS god. So when he says something, it is not just accidental; when he says something, it is from his very core.

Kabir is a mystic poet. Listen to his melody, sing his song... and if you have understood, then become a little more aware. And don't look for the forest! There are only trees, there is no forest -- `forest' is just a collective noun, an abstraction. There is no God high in the heaven; there are gods and gods and gods -- the tree god, the rock god, the river god, the man god, the woman god -- there are gods and gods and gods... but there is no God.

This whole existence is divine. Love the trees if you want to know anything about the forest. Love people if you want to know anything about God. Each particular manifestation can become a window, a door. Don't be obsessed too much by words -- the word `god' is not God, the word `love' is not love, and the word `fire' of course is not fire. Drop words, and move more and more towards the existential.