III / (xi)
The Outer and the Inner
The way to salvation lies not outside; it is within. Outer rituals are of no avail and, though it is desirable to honour the memory of past Masters, to be lost in the worship of Their samadhs, statues or pictures cannot be of any substantial use. One must hold up Their lives as a model and, like Them, concentrate upon the world within.
Baba Ji Himself would spend weeks in Bhajan and Simran with only short breaks for food. He always encouraged His disciples to give as much time as possible to the sadhans He had taught.
Constant remembrance of the Lord was the best protection against attachment and Maya; and one should maintain the five-fold Simran all the hours of the day. No less important was Bhajan, which needed more concentrated attention. Whatever the matter, however preoccupied with outer duties, the disciple must find some time every day – be it ever so little – for Bhajan.
Only through maintaining the link with Shabd could anything be gained; and once a disciple had strengthened the link with Shabd through constant practice, the Inner Music flowed in incessantly at all hours of the day, becoming a clarion-call forever inviting him within and deftly lifting him, like a silken robe, from off the thorns of earthly desires.
In short, Baba Ji taught Spirituality as a non-sectarian Inner Discipline which was accessible to all.
He always emphasised that the matter was not one of outer forms and sects:
it was entirely a question of Inward Purification and Practice. He who could find a True Master, grow into an apt disciple, and unfailingly pursue the sadhan he had been taught would, without doubt, sooner or later, reach Sat Lok.
*The Satguru’s task was to take the soul to the Sat Purush on beholding Whom it realised itself to be of the same essence and saw the Satguru and the Supreme Lord as One and indivisible. There it merged into the Sat Naam and with whose help receded further into the Alakh, Agam, Anami (or Radhasoami) and even to a Wonder Region beyond as will be evinced from one of the letters of Baba Ji – presented in 'Spiritual Gems' –, each marking a further stage of the soul’s absorption from name and form into the Nameless and the Formless, the Final Stage being beyond all forms of Light and Sound and therefore wholly indescribable in terms of human experience.
* (This section is adjusted to the First Edition of 1960;
Editor’s Note 2011.)
One could succeed in this Path irrespective of one’s social or religious background.
True to Swami Ji’s injunctions, Baba Ji attempted to interpret Spirituality in as non-sectarian a manner as possible. He did away with many of the older outer practices, chief among them being bhaint or tribute to the Guru, leaving it entirely to the wishes of the disciple to subscribe towards the running of the Satsang. Nor did He encourage the adoration of any particular mode of salutation that might tend to grow into the mark of a creed.
*While at Murree, Bibi Rukko once – under the influence of a recent visit to Agra – instructed the Satsangis to greet Baba Ji when He came with the words Radhasoami.
Baba Ji was far from pleased:
See that in future you do not repeat the mistake,
He admonished,
We spirits come not to create new sects and creeds. We are here to dissolve all differences. Wherefore distract these simple people with these outer slogans? My task is to take them within and let them greet me each according to the traditions of his community.
* (This section is adjusted to the First Edition of 1960;
Editor’s Note 2011.)
As we have already seen, He had a nucleus of Muslim disciples and He never gave them the feeling that they had in any way to renounce their own faith. It was only a field of study like mathematics or astronomy that people all over the world could take up and master, and what He taught them were the very same truths that the greatest of the Sufis – Jalal-ud-Din Rumi, Hafiz, Shamas-i-Tabrez, Inayat Khan – had given out to Their disciples.
This task was carried further by Baba Ji’s Spiritual Son, Hazur Sawan Singh Ji. During His ministry, Baba Ji’s prophecy was fulfilled and the Satsang expanded tremendously. The message of the Great Master was carried across the seas, and men of all faiths sought shelter in its fold. In conformity with these new developments and to suit the changing spirit of the age, Hazur Sawan Singh Ji began to interpret the timeless message as an Inner Science.
More and more of the outer ritual was shed, and practices like Charan Amrit or Mukh Amrit and Arti completely disappeared.
Like Baba Ji, He was ever willing to meet the spiritual leaders of all faiths; and Dr Julian Johnson, one of His American disciples, records in his book 'With a Great Master in India' how He would visit the places of worship of every sect wherever He went.
The scientific tendency has continued to gather strength and men are no longer willing to accept Spirituality, as in former days, as a matter of devotional faith.
We must be convinced,
they say,
we must have proofs. We cannot be satisfied simply with doing in a blind way what our forefathers did.
So, keeping pace with these developments, the Ruhani Satsang in Delhi has finally abolished, in consonance with the wishes of Hazur Sawan Singh Ji, the last vestiges of ritual; even the Living Master’s photograph is not held up for attention.
Stripped of all its outer encrustations, Spirituality emerges as a science, as scientific as any other, as verifiable in its results.
Let any seeker take it up and let him create in the laboratory of the soul the conditions that are prerequisite, and as sure as the day follows the night, shall he rise into the Kingdom of God.
Kirpal Singh