Kirpal Singh

Selections from ‘The Crown of Life’

Part I: Chapter I – Yoga: An Introduction

Here one might ask the question as to the need for Union between the soul and the Oversoul when the two are essentially the same and are already embedded, one in the other. Theoretically speaking, it is all right, but how many of us are consciously aware of this and work practically in the light and life of this knowledge and awareness. On the other hand, the soul is always following the lead of the mind, the mind that of the senses, and the senses that of the sense-objects with the result that the soul by constant association with the mind and the senses, for ages upon ages, has completely lost its own individual – undivided – identity and has for all practical purposes become identified with the mind. It is this veil of ignorance which has come in between the soul and the Oversoul that has got to be removed to enable the soul to come into its own, to realise its inherent nature and then to seek its Real Home and gain Life Eternal. All the religions were originally designed by man solely with this end in view but unfortunately in course of time, man gradually drifts away from the Reality and becomes the slave of his own handicrafts and religions, as religions deteriorate into institutionalised churches and temples, rigid codes of moral and social conduct, lacking the living touch and the pulsating Life-Impulse of Their founders.

I know no disease of the soul but ignorance,

says Ben Jonson.

How to remove the veil of ignorance is the problem of problems. We have allowed it to grow into an impervious rock too hard to be blasted. […]

Part I: Chapter II / III – Ashtang Yoga and Modern Man

Many modern scholars, more so those with western modes of thought, have, when first confronted by yoga, tended to dismiss it as no more than an elaborate means of self-hypnotism. Such an attitude is quite unscientific even though it often parades under the garb of science. It is generally the result of prejudice born of ignorance or a superficial knowledge of the subject. It is natural for us to attempt to relegate to the realm of superstition, phenomena with which we are unfamiliar and which defy our habitual ways of thought about life, for, to study them, to understand them, to test them and accept them would require effort and perseverance of which most of us are incapable. It is not unlikely that some so-called yogins may justify the label of ‘self-hypnotists.’ But those few who genuinely merit the name of yogis, those – so few – who are too humble to court publicity have, nothing about them to suggest the neurotic escapist. They invariably display a remarkably sensitive awareness of life in all its complexity and variety; and this awareness coupled with their humility makes all talk of self-delusion quite inapt, irrelevant and even ridiculous. For, to seek the unchanging behind the changing, the Real behind the phenomenal is certainly not to ‘hypnotise’ oneself. If anything, it displays a spirit of enquiry that is exceptional in its honesty and integrity, that is content with nothing less than the Absolute Truth, and the kind of renunciation it demands is the most difficult to practise.

Hence it is that as time passes, as knowledge is gradually undermining ignorance, the former philistinism is steadily wearing away and the new developments of the physical sciences have had no small share in furthering this process, for, by revealing that everything in this physical universe is relative and that matter is not matter per se but ultimately a form of energy, it has confirmed at its lower level at least the conception of the world inherent in the yogic system, giving it a scientific validity which was earlier doubted.

Part II: Chapter I / IV – The Master

A system in which the Teacher is so central to every aspect of the student’s outer and inner discipline and progress and without Whose instruction and guidance nothing could be done, must lay great emphasis on the principle of Grace; and mystic literature is not wanting in stressing and underlining this aspect.

But if from one angle it is the Master Who bestows everything upon the disciple, it must not be forgotten that in doing this He is only repaying a debt He owes to His own Guru, for the gift He bestows is the gift He Himself received when He was at the stage of a disciple; and so, He usually never claims anything for Himself but attributes His Power to the Grace of His own teacher. Besides, from another angle everything is in the disciple himself and the Master does not add anything from outside. It is only when the gardener waters and tends the seed that it bursts into life, yet the secret of life is in the seed itself and the gardener can do no more than provide the conditions for its fructification. Such indeed is the function of the Guru.

An ancient Indian parable vividly brings out this aspect of Master-disciple relationship.

Once, it relates, a shepherd trapped a lion’s cub and reared him with the rest of his flock. The cub judging himself by those he saw around him, lived and moved like the sheep and lambs, content with the grass they nibbled and with the weak bleats they emitted. And so time sped on until another lion saw, one day, the growing cub grazing with the rest of the flock. He guessed what had happened and pitying the baby lion’s plight, he fearlessly went up to him, drew him to the side of a quiet stream, made him behold his reflection and his own, and, turning back, let forth a mighty roar. The cub now understanding his true nature, did likewise and his erstwhile companions fled before him. He was at last free to enjoy his rightful place and thence-forward roamed about as a king of the forest.

The Master is indeed such a lion. He comes to stir up the soul from its slumber and presenting it a mirror makes it behold its own innate glory without His touch, it would continue anaesthetised, but were it not itself of the essence of life, nothing could raise it to Spiritual Consciousness. The Guru is but a lighted candle that lights the unlit fellows. The fuel is there, the wick there, He only gives the gift of flame without any loss to Himself. Like touches like, and the spark passes, and that which lay dark is illumined and that which was dead springs into life. And as with the lighted candle, its privilege lies not in its being an individual candle but in its being the seat of the unindividual flame that is neither of this candle nor of that but of the very essence of all fire. So too with the True Master: he is a Master not by virtue of his being individual master like anyone else, but He is a Master carrying in Him the Universal Light of God. […]