MEDITATION

THE SECRET OF SECRETS VOL1

Riding on a Miracle

Secret of the Golden Flower Master Lu Tsu and the Antahkarana

 TO CONCENTRATE THE SEED-FLOWER OF THE HUMAN BODY ABOVE IN THE EYES, THAT IS THE GREAT KEY OF THE HUMAN BODY. CHILDREN, TAKE HEED! IF FOR A DAY YOU DO NOT PRACTISE MEDITATION, THIS LIGHT STREAMS OUT, WHO KNOWS WHITHER? IF YOU ONLY MEDITATE FOR A QUARTER OF AN HOUR, BY IT YOU CAN DO AWAY WITH THE TEN THOUSAND AEONS AND A THOUSAND BIRTHS. ALL METHODS END IN QUIETNESS. THIS MARVELLOUS MAGIC CANNOT BE FATHOMED.

 BUT WHEN THE PRACTICE IS STARTED, ONE MUST PRESS ON FROM THE OBVIOUS TO THE PROFOUND, FROM THE COARSE TO THE FINE. EVERYTHING DEPENDS ON THERE BEING NO INTERRUPTION. THE BEGINNING AND THE END OF THE PRACTICE MUST BE ONE. IN BETWEEN THERE ARE COOLER AND WARMER MOMENTS, THAT GOES WITHOUT SAYING. BUT THE GOAL MUST BE TO REACH THE VASTNESS OF HEAVEN AND THE DEPTHS OF THE SEA, SO THAT ALL METHODS SEEM QUITE EASY AND TAKEN FOR GRANTED. ONLY THEN HAVE WE MASTERED IT.

 AN OLD FABLE has it that when God was creating the world he was approached by four questioning angels. 'How are you doing it?' the first one asked. The second queried, 'Why?' The third one said, 'May I have it when you finish?' The fourth one said, 'Can I help?'

 The first one was the question of the scientist, the second, the philosopher's, the third, the politician's, and the fourth was the question of the religious one.

 The scientific inquiry into existence is that of detached observation. The scientist has to be objective. To be objective he has to remain uninvolved; he cannot participate, because the moment he becomes a participant he becomes involved. Hence the scientist can only know the outer circumference of life and existence. The innermost core will remain unavailable to science; its very methodology prohibits it.

 The philosopher only speculates, he never experiments. He goes on asking AD infinitum, 'Why?' And the question is such that whatsoever the answer, it can be asked again -- 'Why?' There is no possibility of any conclusion through philosophy. Philosophy remains in a state of non-conclusion. It is a futile activity; it leads nowhere.

 The politician simply wants to possess the world, to own it. He is the most dangerous of all because he is the most violent. His interest in life is not in life itself but in his own power. He is power-hungry, power-mad; he is a maniac, he is destructive. The moment you possess something alive, you kill it, because the moment something becomes a property it is no more alive. Possess a tree, and it is no more alive. Possess a woman or a man, and you have killed them. Possess anything, and death is the outcome, because only death can be possessed.

 Life is freedom. It remains basically free. You cannot possess it, you cannot put it into the bank, you cannot draw a line around it. You cannot say, 'This is mine'; to say so is disrespectful, to say so is egoistic, to say so is mad.

 Life possesses us. How can we possess it? We have to be possessed by life more and more. The whole gestalt has to change: from being possessive, one has to become capable of being possessed by the whole.

 The politician never comes to know the truth of life.

 The religious person participates. He dances with life. He sings with existence. He helps life. He is surrendered to existence, and he is not detached and aloof. He does not really ask any question, he is not after knowledge; his whole effort is how to be in harmony with existence, how to be totally one with it. Hence the Eastern word for the ultimate experience: SAMADHI.

 It comes from two words. SAM -- SAM means together with. The same root SAM has moved into English, too; it is in 'sympathy', it is in 'symphony'. A little bit changed, it is in 'synthesis', 'synchronicity'. SAM means together with. ADHI means the lord, God. SAMADHI means union with God, to be one with God. And that is exactly the meaning of the English word 'religion'. It means to become one with existence; not to be divided, not to remain separate but to become one. And only in this oneness does one come to know, see, experience, and be.

 Religion is also a great experiment -- the greatest, in fact -- but with a difference. Science experiments with the object, religion experiments with the subject itself. Its whole concern is: Who am I?

 One should begin from the beginning. Unless I know myself, I am not going to know anything else. If deep down I remain ignorant, then my whole knowledge is just garbage. It is based on ignorance, it is rooted in ignorance. First the light has to happen inside me, and then it can spread. Then it can go to the very boundaries of existence -- if there are any boundaries. But first this has to happen within me. The first flame has to come from my subjectivity. When my centre is full of light, then only will whatsoever is known really be known. Unless you know yourself, unless the knower is there, how can you know anything else? If you yourself are in deep darkness, all the lights that you have created outside are deceptions, illusions.

 The religious quest is the greatest quest in existence. A few things have to be understood about this quest.

 The first thing: religion cannot creep; it has to dance or die. And that's what is not happening in the world -- religion is not dancing, hence it has died. Religion is creeping and crawling; it has forgotten how to fly. Religion has become dogma. Dogma is death; it is a corpse. To be flowing and alive and flying, religion has to exist as an experience -- not as a theory, not as theology, but as meditation; not as a philosophy about God but as a personal experience of God. And, know perfectly well: to know about God is not to know God. You can go on knowing about and about, but you will never know God. To know about is to go round and round without penetrating the very centre of it.

 Religion cannot creep, and religion is creeping. Christianity, Hinduism, Islam -- they are all creeping. They have all become apologetic. They are all afraid of the scientific growth in the world. They have been fighting against science. They tried all that they could do to prevent scientific growth, but they failed. Now they try to get all of their support from science -- whatsoever they can manage -- but they know perfectly well that they have become secondary. They can exist only if science supports them. They can exist only if scientific argument becomes a prop. This is creeping. Religion is no more on its own ground, on its own feet; it needs support from science. It is living a borrowed existence, a borrowed life. Its time is gone.

 Why has it happened? Once a religion becomes dogma and is no more experience, it dies automatically. And a dead body cannot stand on its own, it needs support. All the churches and the temples are supported, they are not standing on their own.

 When there is a Buddha he stands on his own. When there is a Christ he stands on his own. Then religion dances, sings a song. Then it is alive, it blooms, there are a thousand and one flowers, and great fragrance is released.

 My effort here is to make religion dance again. There is no need for any support, because religion in itself is the greatest authentic experience. Others should look towards science for support, not religion! If religion starts dancing, starts becoming alive, science will need its support, because science itself is losing ground. It is becoming uglier and uglier every day. It is becoming more and more life-negative every day. It is becoming more and more political every day. All that science discovers is possessed by the politician. And all that science discovers serves death; it is no more serving life. Ninety percent of scientific effort goes on war. Science is losing face. Unless religion starts dancing, even science will no longer have any future. Science will need some release of energy from religion to support it. And if religion can be alive again and science becomes a part, a shadow of religion, then only can it be free of the politician and his madness. Otherwise it seems impossible.

 Man is coming closer and closer to the ultimate destruction of life on the earth. Only a release of religious energy can save him, can save humanity.

 What we are doing here may look like a very small experiment, but its potential is infinite. The future of humanity depends on only one thing: that religion can again lead man, that religion can again become the central influence on man, that religion can again become humanity's dream.

 And remember, it is a very difficult dream -- almost impossible. To dream to be with God, to dream to be in God, is bound to be something like an impossible dream. Man has lost courage. His dreams are tiny now, his dreams are very mundane; he no longer dreams of the transcendental. And remember, if you stop dreaming about the transcendental, you will live a meaningless life. Meaning arises only in contact with the transcendental. Meaning arises only when you are part of a greater whole, when you are part of something higher than you, something bigger than you. When man tries to surpass himself then there is religion. And that's what I call the dance of religion -- man trying to transcend himself. No other animal can do it. No other animal is capable of it. Only man has the potential and the possibility to surpass himself. And a few men have surpassed themselves; a few men have reached to the other shore.

 And when I am talking to you, I am talking from the other shore. Hence, I am not saying it from borrowed knowledge, I am saying it from my own experience. I know the impossible can become possible. It has become possible in me, it can become possible in you. Once your inner being becomes full of light, once you know no darkness within yourself, then you are religious.